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I 



THE HEEL OF WAR 



it 



The contents of this book have already appeared 
in the Sunday Magazine of the New York Times. 
Acknowledgment is hereby made of the courtesy 
which has permitted their reprint. 



I 



THE HEEL OF WAR 



BY , 



GEORGE B. McCLELLAN 




G. W. DILLINGHAM COMPANY 

PUBLISHERS NEW YORK 



The Heel of War 



COPYRIGHT, 1916, .^ \ 5 



BY 
G. W. DILLINGHAM COMPANY 



ALL EIGHTS RESERVED 



PUBLISHED JANTJAEY, 1916 



PRINTED IN THE UNITED STATES OF AMERICA 
LINOTYPE COMPOSITION, ELECTRO' CY PES, PRESSWORK AND BINDINa 

BY 

The J. J. Little & Ives Company 
^25-Jk35 East Uth Street 
New York Cit 



n:y. "* ^' 



APR '-8 1916 

g)CiA427597 



CONTENTS 



Preface 



PAGE 

ix 



CHAPTER I 
ECONOMIC CONDITION OF GERMANY 

Conditions are practically normal. No lack of 
work, food, necessities, or even luxuries. 
Restaurants, theatres and hotels running 
about as usual. In very few instances are 
women doing the work of men. Splendid con- 
dition of soldiery. Special provision made for 
wounded. Hospital service unsurpassed. Pris- 
oners well cared for in sanitary camps near 
military centres. Gold reserve larger than at 
beginning of war. Building operations are on 
the increase 1 

CHAPTER II 
GERMANS CONFIDENT OF VICTORY 

Great admiration felt for rank and file of British 
soldiers, and for the ignorant bravery of offi- 
cers. Italy considered negligible. Russians 
are particularly courageous. Ill-feeling toward 
France. Surprise at unfriendly attitude of 
United States press. Birth of "two schools of 
thought": (1) Annexationists, who wish to 
hold all land already gained, and (2) Anti- 
annexationists, who want only certain naval 
stations and such territory as will hold England 
in check. Possible adjustments in other in- 
terested nations after the war 22 



vi CONTENTS 

CHAPTER III 
BELGIUM UNDER GERMAN RULE ^,^„ 

Conditions are not abnormal in any way. Un- 
employment exists because capitalist class will 
not resmne usual industrial activities. Train 
service superior to that of France. Crops 
unusually abundant. Plenty of native labor 
to gather it. No lack of cattle, sheep or poul- 
try. Newspapers running as usual. No rigid 
censorship in evidence. In fact there is little 
to suggest German occupation. Effectiveness 
of Belgian Red Cross Organization. Excellent 
work of American Relief Commission .... 52 

CHAPTER IV 
LOUVAIN 

Accounts of serious damage to city greatly exag- 
gerated. No evidence of shell fire. Four 
Belgian versions of alleged wilful destruction 
of town. Official German version. Concerted 
attack by native villagers upon peaceful Ger- 
man soldiers. Coming of reinforcements de- 
feated purpose of Belgians. Houses were fired 
in order to smoke out the '^snipers.'' Cathe- 
dral and art treasures saved from fire by 
German soldiers. Stagnation of Antwerp. 
Loss of shipping interests 72 

CHAPTER V 
FRANCE SACRIFICES TO WIN 

No real hatred for Germany except among Amer- 
ican colony and a small section of unrepre- 
sentative French. French people make many 
sacrifices for ^'La Patrie." Irritability in 



CONTENTS vii 

PAGE 

Government circles. French people kept in 
ignorance of real conditions. Establishment 
of oppressive dictatorship without consent of 
people or parliament. Viviani Ministry em- 
ploys miconstitutional methods. Censorship 
active. No uncensored ''war news " permitted 
from the front. No German newspapers al- 
lowed. All mail matter held up five days 
before leaving France 96 

CHAPTER VI 
DISAFFECTION WITH VIVIANI MINISTRY 

The illegal status of the ruling ministry. Praise 
of General Joffre. French politicians criticise 
British tactics. France has no more men for 
the army. Fall of Calais and seizure of Suez 
Canal means end of war. Creusot blunder 
and exoneration of General Joffre. Fear of 
''war dictatorship" being retained after peace 
is declared. Should Germany win, she will 
find it to her interests to preserve the French 
repubUc intact 121 

CHAPTER VII 
ITALY'S ATTITUDE TOWARD THE WAR 

Italian vacillation and uncertainty as to course of 
action. Her strength not equal to her political 
ambitions. Italy remained neutral only so 
long as it served her interests to do so. The 
"break" with Austria-Hungary. The fail- 
ure of Von Billow's negotiations. Result- 
ing "deadlock" with Central Empires. So- 
nino's radical alteration of Italy's foreign 
policy. Italy joins forces with the Allies . . . 138 



viii CONTENTS 

CHAPTER VIII 
GIOLITTI AND THE ITALIAN GOVERNMENT 

PAGE 

For fifteen years Giolitti has dominated Italian 
politics. Government furious at Giolitti's in- 
tervention. Resignations of ministry handed 
in. Example of mob psychology. King at- 
tempted to form new government. Continua- 
tion of Salandra ministry. War declared 
against Austria-Hungary. Italy doomed to 
disappointment no matter what the outcome 
may be. Conduct of Italian people worthy 
of highest praise 162 



PEEPACE 

GEORGE B. McCLELLAN is recog- 
nized as an authority on the politi- 
cal history of modem Europe. He 
spent half of this year travelling through the 
war-stricken countries of Europe, that he 
might see with his own eyes and hear with 
his own ears. His journey took him through 
France, Belgiiun, Holland, Germany, Switz- 
erland and Italy. 

Having often visited these countries in the 
happier days of peace, and having formed a 
wide acquaintance with the men who have 
shaped the political policies of the Powers, 
Mr. McClellan was admirably equipped to 
make a first-hand study of Europe at war. 

The results of his observations were em- 
bodied in a series of articles in the New York 

ix 



X Preface 

Times, which have aroused so much discus- 
sion here and abroad that, with the permis- 
sion of the proprietors of the Times, they 
have been brought together in this book, 
after revision by the author. 

That it is a difficult task for a neutral 
American — ^no matter how broad his knowl- 
edge of European peoples, their history and 
politics and ambitions, or how earnest his ef- 
fort to write without prejudice — ^to tell what 
he has seen on the Continent without having 
to face the charge of partisanship, no one 
will deny. The warfare of words in Amer- 
ica has been as bitter as the warfare of blood 
across the Atlantic. 

Mr. McClellan has not escaped criticism, 
despite the fact that, as a neutral observer 
with a warm affection for the peoples 
of France, Germany and Italy, he has 
attempted to report only the facts as 



Preface 



XI 



he saw them on both sides of the war 
zone. 

Mr. McClellan needs no introduction to 
American readers. The son of a famous 
father — General George B. McClellan of the 
Civil War — ^the author of this book has been 
for five terms a Member of Congress, for six 
years Mayor of New York, and is now Pro- 
fessor of Economic History in Princeton 
University. 

December, 1915. 



THE HEEL OF WAR 

CHAPTER I 

ECONOMIC CONDITION OF GERMANY 

Conditions are practically normal. No tack of work, 
food, necessities, or even luxuries. Restaurants, 
theatres and hotels running about as usual. In very 
few instances are women doing the work of men. 
Splendid condition of soldiery. Special provision 
made for wounded. Hospital service unsurpassed. 
Prisoners well cared for in sanitary camps near 
military centres. Gold reserve larger than at be= 
ginning of war. Building operations are on the 
increase. 

1HAVE written of what I saw and heard 
in Germany, as I saw and heard it, 
giving my impressions with as little 
comment as possible. 
During the last six months I have visited 

Italy, France, Switzerland, Germany, Bel- 

1 



2 The Heel of War 

giiuii, and Holland, four belligerent and two 
neutral countries. Of tliem all Germany is 
by far the most normal, conditions witMn 
the German Empire being much nearer the 
usual than anywhere I have been in Europe 
since the war began. 

I entered Germany at Lindau, in Ba- 
varia, visited Miinchen, Dresden, Berlin, and 
Koln, and crossed the border into Belgium 
at Herbersthal. Of the cities, all of which 
I know extremely well, one is Bavarian, one 
Saxon, and two Prussian. Yet in them all 
conditions were imiformly normal. There 
were fewer young men in the streets than 
usual and more people in mourning, each 
individual is limited to two hundred and 
fifty grams of war bread a day, and the beer 
gardens close at nine in the evening, so as 
to reduce the consumption of beer for the 
benefit of the men at the front, otherwise 



Germany 



there is notMiig to show that Germany is at 
war. 

The hotels, restaurants, and shops are all 
open and doing a good business. Prices are 
generally as they were before the war, and 
there is no lack of any of the necessities and 
luxuries of life. The schools, theatres, and 
opera are going, the food in the restaurants 
is plentiful and good,, by far the best and 
cheapest I have had this summer ; there are 
enough excellent express trains, with sleep- 
ing and dining cars running on the usual 
schedules; plenty of horse and motor cabs, 
and an ample supply of men in the vigor and 
prime of life to carry on the economic and 
military existence of the State. 

I was in Miinchen on the King's name day 
and saw the streets ^^kept" by 15,000 new 
troops of the ^^ Ersatz Eeserves," men who 
had never before served with the colors. 



4 The Heel of War 

They were all in new field-gray uniforms, 
fully armed and equipped, well set-up, fine, 
soldierly fellows, none over 39 years old. 
They were Landsturm troops of the third 
line of reserves, and yet any nation but Ger- 
many would have been proud to have had 
them in her first line. 

There has been no general substitution of 
women for men in industrial life, although 
many of the train conductors, railway work- 
ers, servants in the restaurants, and a few 
auto cab drivers are now women. 

A good deal of building is going on every- 
where. In Berlin the new underground rail- 
way, and the new artificial harbor are being 
pushed to completion, the shop windows are 
filled with novelties, and I am informed by 
those who know more of the matter than I 
do, that the modes at the dressmakers and 
milliners are newer than are those of their 



Germany 



Paris rivals, who have suffered greatly from 
the war. 

The musemns and picture galleries are 
open and crowded, the only observable 
change being that they close an hour earlier 
than usual, and that older men have been 
substituted for the attendants who have been 
called to the front. 

If Germany is in want the fact is no- 
where observable. Her economic condition 
seems to be far better than is that of Italy 
or France, or even of Switzerland. Certain- 
ly one can live better and more cheaply in 
Germany than in any of the countries that 
I have lately visited, life is less difficult, 
there is more prosperity and less poverty. 
Unemployment has practically ceased, for 
every man and woman able to work is being 
used either directly or indirectly in the serv- 
ice of the Fatherland. 



6 The Heel of War 

On all sides one sees evidence of the mar- 
velous economic strength of the country. It 
is proved in small things as well as in great. 
Not only is the gold reserve twice as large 
as it was before the beginning of the war, 
not only do the supplies of capital seem in- 
exhaustible for the transformation of old 
peace industries into war material factories 
and for the creation of new munitions 
plants, for the development and enlarge- 
ment of the railway system for war pur- 
poses and the continuation of peace enter- 
prises, but there is money enough to clothe 
every recruit in a new uniform and to bury 
every dead soldier in the uniform in which 
he was killed, luxuries which no other con- 
tinental army has been able to afford. 

The Germans insist that if their enemies 
expect to win through the economic weak- 
ness of Germany they are leaning on a feeble 
reed, for the empire is no weaker than it 



Germany 7 

was a year ago. On the contrary, they claim 
to have adapted themselves to war condi- 
tions, and to be self-sustaining, so that were 
it necessary the war might be prolonged in- 
definitely. 

I was in Germany during a period of 
great tension, just after the sinking of the 
Arabic, when American public opinion as 
voiced by the press was greatly excited, some 
American newspapers even clamoring for 
war. Yet nowhere that I went did I receive 
anything but the most helpful courtesy and 
consideration. Every German official, sol- 
dier, and citizen with whom I came in con- 
tact was not only willing but anxious to aid 
me in seeing for myself the real conditions 
of the country. Even those with whom I 
had no personal acquaintance, despite my 
evident Americanism and outspoken admi- 
ration for the French, were uniformly polite 



8 The Heel of War 

and kindly. Speaking English on the streets 
and in the restaurants results in only a mild 
interest among one's neighbors. One can 
easily imagine the consequences of speaking 
German in either Rome, Paris, or London. 

Apart from the questions of recruitment 
and the ordinary support of the civil popu- 
lation, the two grayest problems which have 
confronted Germany during the war have 
been the care of the wounded and of prison- 
ers. The wounded have been distributed 
among all the large cities, being sent directly 
from the field stations to the nearest avail- 
able centre. Not only are the ordinary civil 
hospitals used, but a great number of mili- 
tary ^ lazarets" have been improvised. 
There are some thirty-six hospitals of vari- 
ous sizes in Miinchen, twenty in Dresden, 
and forty in Berlin. 

The great distributing lazaret which I 



Germany 9 

visited in Miinclien is located in the new 
Custom House, which was transformed into 
an up-to-date, ahnost ideal modem hospital 
of 2,000 beds in less than six weeks after the 
outbreak of the war. The system in force in 
Miinchen is followed in almost all the other 
cities. The trains coming from the front 
run directly into the hospital. The men who 
are on stretchers are lifted out into a vast 
examination room, from which those who 
need immediate attention or who cannot 
stand further transportation are sent up- 
stairs to the operating rooms, or wards. The 
rest are loaded on tram cars, still on their 
stretchers, and sent to the various other hos- 
pitals in the city. The trolley tracks have 
been extended so that practically all trans- 
portation of wounded is by tram car, instead 
of by ambulance, resulting in greater speed 



10 The Heel of War 

in transportation, more comfort for the men 
and consequently a lower death rate. 

The hospitals which I visited in Germany 
— and I visited a number — are scrupulously 
clean and well kept, and very comfortable. 
Much is done for the men's amusement, in- 
cluding ^^Kaffee und kuchen" every after- 
noon, during which there is usually a band 
concert. They are well cared for and have 
all they need, even to two dietaries, which I 
am told is not the case elsewhere. 

The German wounded, like the wounded 
of every other country, are patient and 
brave, cheerful and contented. Like other 
Continental soldiers, they are as simple- 
hearted as children and very grateful and 
appreciative for any little presents of choco- 
lates or cigarettes. 

The surgeons seem to be a very superior 
class of men, and the nurses impressed me 



Germany n 

more favorably than any I have seen but our 
own. The supply of trained nurses, of 
course, proved utterly inadequate for the 
needs of the war. The deficiency in numbers 
was made up by volunteers, most of whom 
belong to the aristocracy and middle class, 
and have had preliminary training of from 
six weeks to three months. 

The Germans claim that their losses in 
killed, wounded, and prisoners have been on 
the west front about one-fifth less than those 
of the French and English, and on the east 
front about one-third less than those of the 
Eussians. They also claim that because of 
superior sanitation at the front, by giving 
the men bathing facilities, and more or less 
frequent changes of linen, for field laundries 
follow the troops, and by keeping the 
trenches in a reasonable state of cleanliness, 
85 per cent, of the wounded return to active 



12 The Heel of War 

service. Gas gangrene, that horrible filth- 
germ infection, which is the dread of French 
surgeons, is practically nnl^nown in Ger- 
many, and typhus and cholera have thus far 
been excluded. 

In addition to the regular hospitals there 
are various institutions supported by private 
charity for the purpose of helping particular 
cases. There are schools to teach trades to 
the permanently maimed, and in almost all 
of the large cities homes for the care of the 
totally blind. Of the latter, fortunately and 
curiously, there are less than 1,000 in France 
and less than 900 in Germany. In Germany 
they receive a pension of 1,600 marks, or 
$400, a year, which is more than the average 
peasant in sound health can possibly earn. 
The home for blind soldiers, or Kriegsblin- 
denheim, in Berlin, at No. 12 Bellevue 
Strasse, of which her Excellency Frau von 



Germany is 

Ihne is the head, gives them not only a home 
where they are cared for and receive medical 
attendance, but also a school where there is 
instruction in massage, typewriting, music, 
and rope, basket, and slipper making. 

Germany is quite able to care for her own 
wounded and requires neither surgeons nor 
nurses. Certain supplies are, however, much 
desired, chiefly bandages, which should be 
ten yards long and four inches wide, and ab- 
sorbent cotton. A more or less useful sub- 
stitute for cotton has been invented in special 
wood pulp paper, but cotton is, nevertheless, 
greatly needed. Supplies can be sent to Ger- 
many through the American Red Cross. 
Money can be used to great advantage, and 
the various blind homes, like that at Berlin, 
are supported entirely by private effort. 

One of the largest items of expense for 
Germany in the war has been the care of 



14 The Heel of War 

prisoners. As the German war losses have 
been much smaller than those of the Allies, 
so the nmnber of prisoners taken by the Cen- 
tral Empires have been much greater than 
the nimiber taken by their enemies. The 
Central Empires have taken between them 
some two million prisoners, of whom Aus- 
tria-Hungary has captured about 600,000, 
and Germany about 1,400,000. Eoughly 
speaking, of the prisoners in Germany 50,000 
are English, 400,000 are French and the rest 
are Russians. 

Besides these there are five thousand Brit- 
ish civilians interned near Berlin. The Ger- 
mans do not intern women as the French 
do, and only began interning male civilian 
enemies after the Allies refused to permit 
civilian Germans to return home. Civilian 
Englishmen were not interned until Novem- 
ber, 1914, three months after the war began. 



Germany 15 

when it became evident that Great Britain 
would not release the German civilians she 
had imprisoned. 

The military prisoners are held in the in- 
terior of the empire in prison camps contain- 
ing from three to fifteen thousand men each. 
The officers are kept by themselves in castles 
and country places set apart for the purpose. 
The prisoners of the three enemy nations are 
drafted more or less indiscriminately to the 
different camps. While the French and Rus- 
sians get on very well together, the English 
keep entirely apart, and even among them- 
selves preserve their class distinctions. 
Among the Tommies the captured members 
of the British garrison of Antwerp receive 
a good deal of good-natured chaff. They are 
always known as the C. I. V.'s, or ^* Church- 
ill's innocent victims." 

While in Berlin I was taken to the prison 



16 The Heel of War 

camp at Miincliberg, and except for the mem- 
bers of the Spanish Embassy, which is 
charged with the interests of the Russian 
and French prisoners in Germany, and a few 
correspondents, I was the first foreigner to 
visit it. 

It is not one of the show camps, for it is 
some thirty-five miles from the city, and not 
easy to get at. When I was there there were 
about four thousand French and Eussian 
prisoners, but no British. 

The camp was, of course, not luxurious, 
but it was well policed and fairly comfort- 
able. The food is sufficient, and while plain 
is good and wholesome. As there has been 
some complaint of insufficient food, it may 
not be amiss to give the bill of fare for the 
day of my visit, which, by the way, was en- 
tirely unexpected by the officer in connnand. 
Every one in Germany but prisoners is lim- 



Germany 17 

ited to 250 grains of war bread a day ; pris- 
oners are given a daily allowance of 300 
grams of the same exceedingly good and 
wholesome bread. For breakfast on the day 
in question the prisoners were given coffee 
and bread; for dinner, bread, a heaping 
plateful of beef goulash, which I ate and 
found excellent, and apples ; for supper more 
coffee, bread, sausage, and cheese. There is 
a canteen where all sorts of delicatessen and 
soft drinks may be bought at cost. 

The food is the same in quality, but more 
generous in quantity than that given to the 
German troops. The complaints come chiefly 
from the English, who are used to far more 
meat and far greater variety. I asked one 
of the prisoners at Miinchberg, who in hap- 
pier times is Professor of Philosophy at the 
University of Brest, how he found things. 
He told me that there was enough food, but 



18 The Heel of War 

that the menu was extremely monotonous. 
*' Actually, Monsieur," he said, ^Hhe only 
real complaint that one can make is that one 
is a prisoner." 

There seemed to be the best of good feeling 
between the French and Eussian prisoners, 
although the latter, for the most part peas- 
ants, were obviously far below the former in 
intelligence. All the prisoners are required 
to take a monthly bath, and may bathe as 
often as they like. The French keep the 
bathrooms constantly employed, while the 
Eussians have to be driven there almost at 
the point of the bayonet. The bathrooms, as 
well as the barracks and mess room, are 
steam heated and well lighted. 

Work has been found for a large propor- 
tion of the prisoners at all the camps, in rail- 
way construction, on the fields, and in va- 
rious town industries. It is purely volun- 



Germany 19 

tary, no prisoner being required to work un- 
less lie wants to, and each being paid 65 
pfennigs and an extra meal for each day's 
labor. In yiew of the fact that the German 
private receives from 33 to 60 pfennigs per 
day, the French soldier about the same, and 
the Eussian soldier even less, the pay is not 
so bad, although, of course, far below the 
normal rate of German wages. The British 
prisoners generally decline to work, but the 
French and Eussians do so willingly. In 
many cases the prisoners go to and from 
their work unguarded and seem quite happy 
and contented. As a matter of fact, the 
Eussian moujiks are better off than they 
have ever been in their lives, for they not 
only receive rather better wages than they 
have received in Eussia, but in addition are 
housed, clothed, and fed in greater comfort 
than they have ever known. 



go 



The Heel of War 



The French prisoners receive from home 
an average of 10 marks, or $2.50, and two 
packages a month per man. Since the war 
began the Russian prisoners have received 
absolutely nothing, either from their friends 
at home or from the Eussian Government. 
Despite this fact, and while the French send 
no money back to France, the Russians send 
home almost all the money they earn as agri- 
cultural laborers. 

The Russian prisoners kill time in sleeping 
or gossiping ; ^ the French have devised a 
nmnber of amusements, chief among which 
is theatricals, the plays being written, man- 
aged, and acted and the scenery painted by 
the prisoners themselves. 

I saw a very amusing one-act farce at the 
*^ Grand Theatre de Mlinchberg, " written by 
a professional playwright and acted by a 
company drilled by a Paris manager, who 



Germany 21 

had for leading man and leading '^lady" two 
well-known provincial actors. 

There was great excitement because of the 
rumor that a draft of prisoners which was 
expected the next week would contain a well- 
known tenor and two violinists. 

*^With the material that I already have," 
the manager told me, ^^I shall be able to pro- 
duce grand opera. I-have a trombone, a 
kettle drum and a baritone, and with a 
chorus drawn from the Russians, most of 
whom have voices, I shall do very well. My 
only weakness is in composers. I have one, 
but he has never written anything more than 
cabaret songs. He has ambitions, and per- 
haps he will do. We can, after all, only 
hope. There are other camps that have giv- 
en opera bouffe, but if we succeed we shall 
be the only one that has attemjoted grand 
opera." 



CHAPTER II 

GERMANS CONFIDENT OF VICTORY 

Great admiration fett for rank and file of British 
soldiers, and for the ignorant bravery of officers, 
Italy considered negligible* Russians are particu-' 
larly courageous. Ill=feeling toward France, Sur= 
prise at unfriendly attitude of United States press. 
Birth of *'two schools of thoughf*: (1) Annexa^ 
tionists, who wish to hold all land already gained, 
and (2) Anti=annexationists, who want only cer^ 
tain naval stations and such territory as will hold 
England in check. Possible adjustments in other 
interested nations after the war, 

WHAT is even more impressive 
than the apparent economic 
strength of the empire is the 
confidence of the German people in the out- 
come of the war. During the time I was in 
Germany I talked with a great number of 
Germans, of all walks and conditions of life, 
from the highest to the lowest. All alike, 
statesmen and soldiers, professional men and 

22 



Germany 23 

merchants, shopkeepers and hotel waiters, 
cab drivers and car conductors, expressed 
the same absolute certainty of German vic- 
tory. It is not a matter of opinion or of 
hope with them, as it is with the optimistic 
in the other warring countries, but a feeling 
that it is no more possible for Germany to 
lose than it is for the sun to set in the east. 
They are so certain jof victory that they 
know it is coming, just as they know that 
spring follows winter. No German ever 
says ^^If we win," but always ^^When we 
win." 

The English press has brushed aside the 
German feeling of certainty in success by 
saying that the truth has been withheld from 
the people by Government order, and that 
they have been fed on lies so long that they 
have at last believed them. This explana- 
tion does not explain the phenomenon of 



24 The Heel of War 

German confidence, for the very good reason 
that it is not true. In England and Italy 
the enemy's war bulletins are only printed 
after having been revised by the censor, and 
are not printed at all either in France or 
Eussia, while in none of the allied countries 
can any German newspaper or book dealing 
with the war be obtained. 

Not only do the German newspapers print 
every day the war bulletins of the Allies, just 
as issued, but in Germany alone of all the 
warring countries can the enemies' newspa- 
pers and books be bought. I nowhere in 
Germany had any difficulty in buying the 
English, French, or even Italian newspapers, 
or any of the more recent and successful 
French and English publications on the war. 

The result of this feeling of certainty 
which is reflected in the German press is a 
sentiment of greater tolerance toward their 



Germany 25 

enemies than is shown by the latter toward 
the Central Empires. 

The hatred of the English for the Germans 
is heartily reciprocated, yet it is only fair to 
say that the spirit of hate is expressed less 
yiolently in Germany than it is in Great 
Britain. Germans believe that Great Bri- 
tain brought on the war, and that but for her 
the peace might have been kept for another' 
decade at least. They realize that the war is 
a struggle for supremacy between Germany 
and Great Britain, and that the war's out- 
come will determine the fate of the world for 
many years to come. Such being the case, 
their every energy is concentrated on the de- 
feat of England as the ultimate end of hos- 
tilities, the defeat of the other Allies being 
merely incidental and preparatory to the 
main purpose of what they consider a purely 
defensive struggle. 



m 



The Heel of War 



The excellence of the British Tommy is 
everywhere acknowledged, while the reck- 
less but ignorant bravery of the British 
officers is always spoken of with the greatest 
admiration, the regret being often heard that 
men so gallant should be so incompetent. 

Italy's part in the struggle is regarded as 
being nearly negligible, for General Cador- 
na, although outnumbering his opponents 
nearly four to one, is said to have thus far 
failed to even dent their line of defense. Said 
a prominent German to me : ' ' Besides some- 
what delaying the end of the war, the only 
real result accomplished by Italy's participa- 
tion has been to make it popular in Austria- 
Hungary. Before Italy joined the Allies 
the Austro-Hungarian people, who had 
never been very enthusiastic, were growing 
rather tired of the war. But such is the 
Austro-Hungarian hatred for the Italians 



Germany 27 

that the moment the latter violated the terms 
of the Triple Alliance and embarked on their 
struggle for the acquisition of Austrian ter- 
ritory the Austrian and Hungarian peoples, 
Germans, Magyars, and Slavs alike, all be- 
came enthusiastically eager to humble 
Italy." 

Italy's declaration of war, while angering 
the German people, ha's not evoked the same 
hatred that is felt toward England. Ger- 
mans profess to feel more contempt than 
hatred for the Italians, whom they refuse to 
regard very seriously. For Eussia there is 
felt considerable respect. Her troops are 
considered excellent as defensive fighters, 
patient, brave, and of great endurance. Like 
the English, they are said to be badly offi- 
cered, but nevertheless all German soldiers 
agree that every one of von Hindenburg's 
victories has been the result of the very hard- 



^8 



The Heel of War 



est kind of fighting. The Eussians have 
often been defeated, but never disgraced. 

Mcolai Mcolaievitch is, however, severely 
blamed for the policy he has consistently fol- 
lowed during his long and constant retreat 
of destroying every village he has aban- 
doned, laying waste the country, and bar- 
barously maltreating the people. 

The feeling toward France is one of deep 
respect and unbounded admiration. Joffre 
is considered to be one of the greatest Gen- 
erals the war has produced, and his armies 
are praised without stint for their morale, 
their endurance, and their bravery. 

Upon four points the Germans feel bit- 
terly toward the French. The first is the 
employment of African troops, who have 
brought to Europe, as have some of the Brit- 
ish ^^ native contingents," the savage war- 
fare of their native jungles ; the second is the 



Germany 29 

refusal of the Frencli to permit the bringing 
in of the wounded from between the lines of 
fire, which results in untold and needless suf- 
fering, and adds another unnecessary horror 
to modern warfare ; the third is the intern- 
ment of German women who were found in 
France at the outbreak of the war, although 
Germany has never interned French women ; 
and the fourth is the^ ill-treatment of Ger- 
man prisoners at the beginning of the war. 
Latterly, thanks entirely to the efforts of 
our embassy at Berlin, the condition of the 
prison camps in France has been somewhat 
improved. 

As an offset to the ill-feeling toward 
France is the general belief that had France 
been let alone by England she would not have 
entered the war. England is regarded as the 
marplot of Europe, who not only forced the 
war on Germany, but induced and forced 



30 



The Heel of War 



Prance, Eussia, and Italy to join her. Tak- 
ing advantage of the French desire for *4a 
revanche," she is alleged to have finally per- 
suaded unwilling France to pull England's 
chestnuts out of the fire. 

*^0f all the Allies France is the only one 
who entered the war with a valid excuse," a 
German friend of mine said to me. *^ Re- 
venge as a casus belli may not be admirable, 
but it is at least respectable, which is more 
than can be said for the motives actuating 
either England, Italy, or Russia." 

The German sentiment toward the United 
States can best be described as one of pained 
astonishment. Germans cannot understand 
why the majority of American newspapers 
and so many of the American people are so 
strongly pro-ally. They cannot understand 
the constant talk in American newspapers 
of the violation of Belgian neutrality by the 



Germany 31 

German Army, of the so-called *^ Belgian 
atrocities," and of the Zeppelin raids, any 
more than they can understand the failure 
of so many of our newspapers to print the 
German side of the case. 

Every German believes that when the Ger- 
man Army entered Belgium that country 
had already surrendered her neutrality ; that 
the so-called Belgian atrocities never oc- 
curred, and that, on the other hand, what 
are called in Germany the Russian and Afri- 
can atrocities are unspeakably horrible, and 
that the Zeppelin raids were only under- 
taken in reprisal for the French raids on 
Freiburg of Aug. 2 and 3, 1914, before the 
war had technically begun. 

No German with whom I talked expressed 
himself in favor of war with the United 
States ; on the contrary, all seemed honestly 
in favor of the maintenance of peace. It 



32 



The Heel of War 



seemed to be the general impression that 
some way, honorable to both nations, would 
be found out of the submarine difficulty, al- 
though we are considered as unreasonable 
in insisting that the presence of a single 
American passenger should give a ship im- 
munity from being torpedoed without warn- 
ing in the war zone. 

On the question of the export of arms and 
ammunition there is a feeling of great dis- 
appointment and sorrow at what is generally 
considered our national unfriendliness. The 
technical and legal right of United States 
citizens to export war material is conceded, 
but it is felt that while it is not in violation 
of the letter it is in violation of the spirit of 
neutrality. Germans argue that it is on all 
fours with the lending of money to the bel- 
ligerents, and deeply regret that the Presi- 
dent did not see his way clear to follow up 



Germany 33 

his disapproval of loans to the combatants 
by forbidding the trade in arms. 

Latterly the German press has been far 
more moderate in its tone toward the United 
States than has been the American press in 
its attitude toward Germany. Nevertheless, 
the German people are firmly convinced that 
the shells which are killing and maiming 
their sons are made in the United States 
and that for the sake of the ^^ blood money" 
we receive we are unwilling to forbid the 
traffic. No one in Germany wants war with 
the United States ; very few Americans want 
war with Germany. They insist that it is a 
great pity that, if the peace is to be pre- 
served, which, thanks to German and Ameri- 
can good sense, it doubtless will be, we should 
not retain German friendship. 

They point out that, thanks to our export 
of arms to the Allies, we have already lost 



34 The Heel of War 

any possibility of playing an important role 
single handed when peace comes. German 
friendship, they say, even from the purely 
selfish standpoint, is well worth retaining, 
for after the war a friendly Germany will 
be a far more valuable asset in our nationitl 
development than a Germany that believes 
that we sold ourselves to her enemies and 
did our best to prolong the war. 

Most Germans expect von Hindenburg to 
bring the Russian campaign to a speedy con- 
clusion. It is thought that he will either cap- 
ture Riga and Vilna and then dig himself 
in, or if the reduction of these two places 
takes too long, dig himself in on his present 
line, without making any immediate effort, 
as some have suggested, to capture either 
Petrograd, Moscow, or Odessa. 

What interests intelligent Germans is not 
so much whether ton Hindenburg will dig 



Germany 35 

himself in this week or next, to-day or a 
month hence, as what will the General Staff 
do with his ^ ' striking force ' ' when it has been 
released from the eastern front. 

It is generally supposed that when the 
eastern armies have been ''dug in" 1,000,000 
men can hold the line, and that there wiU be 
available for use elsewhere a German- Aus- 
tro-Hungarian force of nearly 2,000,000. 
The German part of this force has been 
checked, but never defeated, and has won the 
two most overwhelming victories in history 
in actual losses in killed and wounded, the 
battles of Tannenberg and the Masurian 
Lakes. For months the Austro-Hungarians 
have also been constantly victorious. This 
vast army, or rather group of armies, which 
has become Saturated with the belief that 
under the Generals whom it trusts and loves 
— von Hindenburg, von Mackensen, von Lu- 



36 



The Heel of War 



dendorf , and the rest — ^it is absolutely in- 
vincible, may be employed in several differ- 
ent ways. 

The greater part of it may be used in a 
drive against Calais, or through Serbia, in 
the effort to force the French-English ex- 
pedition into the sea and to capture the Suez 
Canal. Many think that the western front 
will be strengthened, for latterly a part of it 
has been held with only a single line, without 
reserves, while the main effort will be made 
against the expeditionary force in Gallipoli. 

Russia is supposed to have been put out of 
the reckoning for some months to come, and 
there are those who think it possible that 
before next summer she may be forced to 
make a separate peace. It is, however, gen- 
erally believed that, for the present at least, 
she will not cause the Central Empires any 
serious anxiety. If the Allies at Gallipoli 



Germany 37 

can be driven into the sea before spring, Eus- 
sia's hope of relief via the Bosporus will 
have been shattered and a separate peace 
will have been brought nearer. 

Germans believe that if a separate peace 
can be forced upon one of the Allies peace 
with the others must follow as a matter of 
course. Peace with Eussia is expected first, 
then with France, and finally with England. 
Peace with Serbia and Italy are considered 
certain whenever the Central Empires can 
spare half a million men for the purpose. 
How long the war will last no one in Ger- 
many is willing to predict. There are those 
who are hopeful enough to think that it will 
be over in another year, but all realize that 
the real end of the war and the lasting peace 
which all Germans hope for can only be 
reached when England has been brought to 
her knees. 



S8 The Heel of War 

It is the fashion among those who espouse 
the cause of the Allies to assume that be- 
cause Great Britain is the richest nation and 
because she is, and for over a century has 
been, the mistress of the seas, she must of 
necessity destroy the power of Germany. 
Whether or not this assumption is well 
founded, it is quite certain that no German 
for a moment supports it. The German be- 
lief is that it is not only possible, but certain, 
that England's allies will be defeated in de- 
tail, leaving at the last the Central Empires 
and England alone and face to face in a final 
life-and-death struggle. 

The Germans hold that this final struggle 
must end in the discomfiture of Great Bri- 
tain. Deprived of her allies and faced with 
the united force of the two great Central 
Empires, who are self -containing and self- 
supporting, with the Suez Canal and Egypt 



Germany 39 

gone and India threatened, they cannot be- 
lieve that the English people will refuse to 
make peace. 

There is a saying in Germany that '^ Great 
Britain will never surrender as long as there 
is a single Frenchman left, or a single Ameri- 
can dollar unspent. ' ' The Germans say that 
when the Allies are crushed and American 
profits curtailed, so th^t it will no longer be 
worth our while to support the English 
cause, when in short Great Britain finds it 
impossible to make other people fight her 
battles for her and is obliged to place in the 
field what the Germans call ^* Kitchener's 
mythical millions, ' ' in other words, when she 
must fight alone, as she is charged with never 
having done in modern times, then, and not 
till then, is it expected that she will be will- 
ing to make peace on terms that will endure 
beyond the lives of the present generation. 



40 The Heel of War 

So certain are the German people of ul- 
timate success that the terms of peace are 
already being generally and seriously dis- 
cussed. The Germans are rapidly grouping 
themselves into two loosely organized par- 
ties, or schools of thought, on the question of 
what the terms of peace should be. For 
want of better designations these may be 
called the ^^annexationists" and the ^'anti- 
annexationists. ' ' 

The annexationists are led by what is 
called the ^^Krupp crowd," and the chief 
agrarians, and include practically all the 
leading industrials and landowners in the 
empire. 

The annexationist movement started at 
Essen with the insistence that Belgimn and 
Northern France must be retained, so as to 
have in German hands a virtual monopoly 
of the coal and iron mines of Western Con- 



Germany 4i 

tinental Europe. Just as the present Ger- 
man tariff law was enacted by the joint ef- 
forts of the great industrials and landown- 
ers, so in the present instance the annexa- 
tionist movement has included the same 
forces. The great landowners seriously ob- 
jected to the retention of Belgium and 
Northern Prance because of the resulting 
and large increase in the industrial vote that 
would follow unless this increase should be 
compensated by the retention of agricultural 
Poland, with its population of 16,000,000 
peasants. Both interests have combined 
and jointly advocate the retention of every 
inch of occupied territory. 

The annexationists may be said to include 
what we would call the ' ' interests, ' ' who, hav- 
ing vast capital at their disposal, are able to 
make a showing which seems to be dispro- 
portionate to their actual strength. 



42 The Heel of War 

The anti-annexationists include most of 
the army, the non-industrial middle class, the 
vast mass of the people, and, if rumor be 
correct, the Chancellor, and — the Kaiser. In 
other words, the struggle seems to be between 
certain great aggregations of wealth on the 
one hand and the rest of Germany on the 
other, with the almost certainty that the self- 
ish and short-sighted ambitions of the inter- 
ests will be defeated. 

The anti-annexationists agree that as Ger- 
many is fighting for self-preservation in a 
war that was forced upon her after years of 
preparation on the part of her enemies, she 
will be justified in exacting peace terms that 
will for a generation at least insure the 
peace and curtail British supremacy. No 
peace can be lasting that ignores the claims 
of nationality, therefore the peace when it 



Germany 43 

comes must be founded upon nationality as 
its base. 

England went to war loudly proclaiming 
the rights of the small nations, say the Ger- 
mans, and forthwith destroyed the newest 
small nation of them all — ^Albania — ^to sat- 
isfy the greed of her ally, Italy. Germany 
must and will be more consistent if the anti- 
annexationists have their way. 

The greatest sinner against the spirit of 
nationality has been Eussia. The misgov- 
erned and oppressed Finns will be taken 
from their master, and, being too small and 
weak to stand alone, will be joined with Swe- 
den in a loose autonomous union. The three 
million Germans in the Baltic provinces will 
be joined to Germany, and this will be the 
only territorial increase that Germany will 
insist upon under the anti-annexationist pro- 
gram. The Eussian Germans have been ill- 



44 The Heel of War 

treated by the Czar's Government, oppressed 
and exploited as an alien and conquered race. 
Their annexation will merely be the recogni- 
tion of their national and racial aspirations. 
Poland united with Galicia, and with, per- 
haps, a part of Prussian Poland, will be 
erected into an independent monarchy, of 
which the Emperor of Austria will be 
crowned king, and constitute a third part 
of a new Austro-Himgarian-Polish empire. 
Strangely enough, except from the annexa- 
tionists, the only objection to this plan comes 
from Austria. The anti-annexationists do 
not want Poland as a part of the German 
Empire, but prefer her as a buffer State 
between Prussia and Russia. The Poles 
themselves prefer to constitute an integral 
part of the Austrian Empire to either mem- 
bership in the German Empire or absolute 
independence, but the Austrian Germans 



Germany 45 

bitterly object to the arrangement. They 
urge, with a great deal of force, that if 16,- 
000,000 Polish Slavs are to be added to the 
domains of the Hapsburgs, the Slav element 
will so greatly outnumber both the Germans 
and Magyars that the empire will become al- 
most as much a Slav nation as is Russia. 
Because of this objection it may be neces- 
sary, the anti-annexationists believe, to con- 
stitute Poland an independent buffer State 
under the joint protection of both Austria- 
Hungary and Germany. 

France, for whom nothing but sympathy 
and admiration is expressed, will at least, 
as far as the Continent is concerned, be left 
in her status quo ante bellum. Calais will be 
taken from England and given back to 
France, for no German believes that France 
will ever recover Calais except by the force 
of German arms, and the northern provinces 



46 The Heel of War 

will be restored. No indemnity will be 
exacted from France or any other nation, for 
it is not believed that any will be in a posi- 
tion to pay. The ^^lost provinces" will not 
be restored, for it is not believed that their 
people, who are fighting so gallantly and loy- 
ally for the empire, would for a moment con- 
sent to the transfer. 

Italy is to be deprived of Albania, the 
islands in the ^gean that she promised to 
give up and did not, and of her colonies. 
The punishment of what Germany calls her 
treachery will be left to England. Great 
Britain's efforts to secure the repayment of 
the money which she has loaned the Italian 
Government, added to the wastage and de- 
struction of the war, are expected to reduce 
Italy to such poverty and misery that for a 
century at least her ambitions need not be 
feared. 



Germany 47 

From Great Britain the anti-annexation- 
ists propose to take back the colonies lost 
during the war, exchanging them here and 
there for mutual convenience. In addition, 
they hope to receive naval stations in differ- 
ent parts of the world, so that Germany may 
share with England in the supremacy of the 
seas. ^^We are fighting for the freedom of 
the seas, ' ' say the anti-annexationists. ^ * We 
do not want a monopoly of the world's com- 
merce, but we insist that England should 
cease her dog-in-the-manger policy and per- 
mit the rest of the world to share in what is 
her exclusive property neither by law nor 
equity. If England is willing to concede 
to us the necessary naval stations, then Bel- 
gium will be returned to the Belgians, al- 
ways excepting a small strip of land between 
Liege and Herbersthal, which for strategical 
purposes we shall be obliged to retain. If 



48 The Heel of War 

England refuses our just demands then, 
much against our will, we shall be forced 
permanently to retain Belgium and to for- 
tify her coast against British aggression." 

In the Balkans the annexationist rear- 
rangement of boundaries will be governed 
by the principle of nationality and also by 
the attitude of the Balkan powers during the 
war. Bulgaria will, of course, receive large 
territorial compensations for having entered 
the war, while the neutrality of Greece will 
be rewarded with the union of the neighbor- 
ing tribes of Greek nationality. Rumania, 
who has played with both sides and been true 
to neither, will be left alone, unless at the 
last moment she throws in her lot with the 
Central Empires. A part of Serbia and Al- 
bania will be annexed to the Slav dominions 
of the Dual Monarchy, which by the addi- 
tion of Poland will become a Trial Mon- 



Germany 49 

arcliy, and may even be reorganized still 
further by the constitution of a fourth au- 
tonomous kingdom of Slavs, including Bos- 
nia, Herzegovina, Croatia, and parts of Al- 
bania and Serbia. 

In Africa and Asia the policy of recogniz- 
ing nationalities is to be carried still further 
and a series of Mohammedan empires is to 
be created under the aegis of Germany, to 
act as buffer States against British aggres- 
sion. 

The Sultan of Turkey is to be restored to 
his ancient authority as Caliph in the Mo- 
hammedan world, Persia is to be freed from 
British and Russian intrigue and reorgan- 
ized as a modern Moslem State. North 
Africa, with the exception of Algeria and 
Tunis, which are to be left to France, wiU 
be divided between the Sultanates of Egypt 
and Morocco. It can be readily seen that 



50 



The Heel of War 



while the anti-annexationist ambitions are 
extremely limited in the direction of terri- 
torial acquisitions they are designed with the 
purpose of forcing from Great Britain a 
part of her world rulership. 

Germany has succeeded in establishing 
her influence beyond dispute in Constanti- 
nople. If she wins the war that influence 
without much doubt can be extended around 
the Mediterranean and across Asia Minor. 
What Germany needs for her economic de- 
velopment is not only colonies, although they 
are most important, but also markets for 
her products. If these can be obtained 
through the friendship of a number of Mo- 
hammedan empires under German influence 
she will have succeeded in displacing Great 
Britain from her position as the first Mo- 
hammedan power and in sharing with her 
the commercial hegemony of the world. 



Germany 51 

The anti-annexationists, like all Germans, 
insist that Germany has no ambition to be- 
come the ruling nation of the earth. That 
she merely desires to obtain from Great Bri- 
tain a fair share of the world's commerce, 
and that in striving to displace England 
from her position of mistress of the seas 
she is fighting the battle of all the nations 
against British despotism. 



CHAPTER III 

BELGIUM UNDER GERMAN RULE 

Conditions are not abnormal In any way, Unemploy-' 
ment exists because capitalist class will not resume 
usual Industrial activities. Train service superior 
to that of France. Crops unusually abundant. 
Plenty of native labor to gather It, No lack of 
cattle, sheep or poultry. Newspapers running as 
usual. No rigid censorship In evidence. In fact 
there is little to suggest German occupation, Effec= 
tlveness of Belgian Red Cross Organization, Ex= 
eel lent work of American Relief Commission. 

1WISH that it were possible that we 
might cross Belgium on our way to 
Holland," I said to a friend of mine 
who occupies a high position in the German 
Imperial Government. 

^^ There is nothing easier than to arrange 
it for you," he replied, ^^but for your wife 
is an entirely different matter. With the ex- 
ception of some nurses, no ladies other than 
Belgian have been allowed to cross into Bel- 

52 



Belgium 53 

gium since the war began. However, one 
can but try, and I shall telegraph for per- 
mission to the Military Government at Brus- 
sels. '^ 

In twenty-four hours the permission came, 
and in twenty-four hours more we were on 
our way. 

We broke the journey at Koln and, accom- 
panied by five trtmks, left there at 8 o'clock 
the next morning on one of the three daily 
express trains, which, with their dining cars, 
run through to Lille via Liege, Louvain, and 
Brussels. There were three other civilian 
passengers on board, and all the rest were 
officers and men returning to the trenches 
after a fortnight's leave, for Germany has 
enough troops to allow each man at the front 
two weeks' leave every six months. 

We crossed the frontier at Herbersthal, 
the formalities being about the same as those 



54 The Heel of War 

in force on entering Russia in time of peace, 
except that our luggage was not opened. 

Our railway followed the route of the Ger- 
man Army on its march to Brussels, and 
signs of fighting were still apparent. There 
are many graves by the roadside and in the 
fields, those of the German and Belgian dead 
marked in the same way, with a little cross, 
bearing a number which corresponds to an 
entry in the official records, which gives the 
tag numbers of all those in each grave. Many 
of the villages show signs of shell fire, and 
many of the railway stations have evidently 
been recently rebuilt. 

The train service is greatly reduced from 
the normal, yet there are more express 
trains, and more dining and sleeping cars 
running from Germany through Belgium to 
within ten miles of the firing line, than there 
are in Prance. In the latter country there 



Belgium 55 

is seldom more than one through train run 
between the principal points each twenty- 
four hours, while in Belgium the chief routes 
are served by from two to six trains daily. 

When the Germans entered Belgium the 
Belgian railway employes almost all disap- 
peared. It was, therefore, necessary for the 
Imperial Government entirely to reorganize 
the service, which has -been effectively done 
with a German personnel. 

The French names of the stations have 
German equivalents substituted. Thus Lou- 
vain becomes Lowen, Liege becomes Liittich, 
and Anvers becomes Antwerpen. 

The railway fares have all been raised, as 
they have everywhere on the Continent, and 
luggage is taxed not by weight as formerly, 
but at the rate of 2.50 francs per trunk. On 
the railways, as everywhere else in Belgiima, 
both German and Belgian money circulate 



56 



The Heel of War 



side by side at the rate of one mark equal to 
1.25 francs. Once inside the Belgian fron- 
tier no further formality is necessary in 
moving from place to place, unless one 
wishes to visit either the firing line or a for- 
tress, in either of which events a further 
permission is necessary. 

On our way to Brussels we passed through 
a fertile country well watered and well 
wooded, the loveliest part of Belgium. This 
year's harvest has been extremely abundant, 
the wheat, rye and barley crops having been 
unusually large, while the fruit crop has 
been far above the average. Despite the size 
of the crops there seems to have been enough 
men to handle them, and in only a few in- 
stances was the German Q-overoment obliged 
to help the peasantry with soldier labor. The 
apple harvest was so large that the Govern- 
ment has made great efforts to encourage the 



Belgium 57 

export of the surplus to Germany, Holland, 
and even to Great Britain. 

Everywhere we went the land was well 
cultivated, every inch of soil seemed to be 
employed, and there was certainly neither 
waste land nor were there crops rotting in 
the fields. There were more men of military 
age working on the farms than we had seen 
in either Germany, Switzerland, or France. 

There is apparently no lack of cattle, sheep 
and poultry, although we saw no signs of the 
16,000,000 pigs the Germans are alleged to 
have driven into Belgimn to devastate the 
land. The cows grazing in the pastures 
seemed as sleek and numerous as usual. If 
the Germans have helped themselves to cat- 
tle, as has been charged, they have left a 
great number untouched. 

We found Brussels very much as we had 
last seen it, five years ago. There were none 



58 The Heel of War 

but military motors in the streets, for all 
private cars have been commandeered. The 
trams, however, were in operation, and there 
were enough horse cabs. Several of the big 
hotels were closed, but most of them were 
open, and the cafes and restaurants were in 
full blast. We dined and lunched at several 
places and had quite as excellent food as one 
usually has in good Parisian restaurants. 
The shops were all open, the streets, espe- 
cially in the shopping districts, crowded with 
the usual movement and bustle of a busy lit- 
tle capital. 

There were many soldiers in evidence, al- 
most all middle-aged men belonging to the 
Landsturm, all the privates carrying their 
rifles when on leave as a precaution against 
attack, although few soldiers have been mur- 
dered since the early days of the occupation. 

Eighteen old and new newspapers are pub- 



Belgium 59 

listed in Brussels. All of the newspapers 
whose proprietors cared to continue them 
still appear, and in addition several new ones 
have been started. They are allowed to print 
the Allies' war bulletins and to comment 
with surprising freedom on the war news. 
While the enemies' newspapers may not be 
sold in Belgium, all of the Dutch newspapers 
are permitted, regardless of whether they 
are for or against Germany. 

French books, even those attacking the 
Germans, may be bought in the shops, the 
line apparently being drawn at the anony- 
mously written ^ * J 'accuse. ' ' 

The photographs of the Belgian King, 
Queen, and Princes, and Belgian, French, 
and English flags are openly displayed and 
sold in the shops and worn by many people 
in their buttonholes. 

The picture gallery is open as usual, imder 



60 



The Heel of War 



its own Belgian Director and Ms staff. 
When I was there it was crowded, many of 
the visitors being German soldiers, a nmnber 
of whom were studying the pictures seri- 
ously, making sketches and taking notes. It 
may be said in passing that, reports to the 
contrary notwithstanding, the Germans have 
taken no pictures out of Belgium. 

Brussels, like all the other cities of Bel- 
gium, is policed by its own native municipal 
force, which has been continued intact, with 
a Geinnan officer at its head. The royal gar- 
den is closed to the public and given over to 
convalescents, and the Eed Cross flag flies 
from the King's palace and a number of pub- 
lic buildings used as hospitals. There are 
great signs with pointing arrows painted at 
some of the street corners to guide military 
motors passing through the city. 

Except for these few changes and the field- 



Belgium ei 

gray uniforms in the streets, there is little, 
on the surface at least, to suggest the Ger- 
man occupation. In fact, Brussels is less 
sad than Paris, and shows to the eye less 
evidence of the war. 

The Germans claim that the people of 
Brussels are becoming reconciled to the pres- 
ence of German troops, and that everywhere 
in Belgium the refugees are returning. It is 
said that less than half a million Belgians 
are still absent in Great Britain, France, 
and HoUand; that ahnost all the peasants 
have returned to the fields, and that the har- 
vest was gathered almost entirely by the Bel- 
gians themselves, with very little help from 
the soldiers. Those who still remain away 
are mostly the rich and factory hands who 
are unwiUing to go home unless assured of 
work. 

Actually less than 1 per cent, of Belgian 



62 



The Heel of War 



factory property has been destroyed during 
the war. That work has not been resumed 
in the factories throughout the country is, I 
am told, due to the unwillingness of the pro- 
prietors to go home and resume operations. 

A flower woman in the market put the mat- 
ter to me in a nutshell: ''We poor people 
will continue to suffer," she said, ''until 'le 
monde chic' comes back. We are suffering, 
of course, from the German occupation, but 
we are suffering more from lack of work. 
The smart people ('le monde chic') are 
really responsible." 

Or as the barber who cut my hair said to 
me: "We proletarians love our country 
enough to come home and try to help her. 
Why can't the capitalists be as patriotic as 
we are?" 

Any one who has seen rich Belgians 
spending their money at French and Swiss 



Belgium 63 

watering places will doubtless echo the bar- 
ber's inquiry. An antiquity dealer with 
whom I talked explained his high prices by 
saying that in his trade demand remained 
normal and supply had not increased. **Our 
rich are buying, not selling, valuables. We 
are a very wealthy people, and now that 
those who have money cannot spend it on 
motor cars and entertaining, they are buy- 
ing pearls and jewelry, books, furniture, and 
pictures." 

These are only incidents, but they serve to 
illustrate the popular feeling. The Germans 
are certainly doing their best to conciliate 
the Belgians, and to administer the country 
as efficiently as possible. 

In the large hospital which has been estab- 
lished in the palace of the Belgian Academy 
there are not only German soldiers but also 
Belgian prisoners. In one ward there are 



64 The Heel of War 

both German and Belgian officers, who seem 
to get on very well together. The private 
soldiers of the two comitries are in separate 
wards, but, as far as I could see, receive 
exactly the same treatment. I saw several 
wounded prisoners who were being visited 
by their relations, a privilege accorded to 
prisoners in no other country. All the pris- 
oners I talked with, including two stray Eng- 
lishmen, told me that they could not have 
been treated more kindly or considerately. 

It was in this hospital that I first saw the 
new German method of treating wounds 
without bandages. It is really the outcome 
of the necessity of getting on with as few 
bandages as possible because of the shortage 
of cotton. The wounded arm or leg is 
clamped fast to a frame and covered with a 
fly screen. The wound is washed from time 
to time with disinfectants and left open, with 



Belgium 65 

nothing but a pad of wood pulp paper as 
protection. The success of the system is said 
to be extraordinary, wounds healing in from 
10 to 15 per cent, less time than formerly. 

It must be remembered that before the war 
social conditions in Belgium left much to be 
desired. The percentage of unemployment 
was large, strikes were frequent, and the 
spirit of social unrest Was constantly grow- 
ing. Brussels was the headquarters of in- 
ternational anarchy. 

The immediate result of the war was to 
increase the destitution which already exist- 
ed and the immorality and vice which al- 
ways accompany great poverty. 

No sooner had Belgium been conquered 
than the conquerors, moved by the German 
spirit of system and of order, began the 
double and extremely difficult task of curb- 
ing vice and reducing unemployment. The 



66 



The Heel of War 



critics of Germany may urge that she was 
influenced in her work of Belgian social re- 
organization by purely selfish motives in her 
own interest and in the interest of her 
troops. But whether this is the case, or 
whether Germany has sincerely desired to 
improYe Belgian conditions for the sake of 
the Belgian people, the fact remains that 
she threw herself whole-heartedly into the 
work. 

General von Bissing, who succeeded Field 
Marshal von der Goltz as Governor of Bel- 
giinn, was unwilling to offend Belgian sus- 
ceptibilities by acting through military 
channels. Accordingly the machinery of the 
Belgian Eed Cross was and is being used 
like a vast charity organization society, 
backed by the power of Germany. 

During the last few weeks a number of 
Belgian ladies, at last convinced of the Gov- 



Belgium 67 

ernor's good faith, have joined the move- 
ment and are doing great service to their 
people. The Belgian Red Cross Society is 
charged not only with checking prostitution 
and reclaiming and caring for fallen women, 
with visiting the needy and sick in their 
homes, and looking out for the children who 
are too young to go to school, but also with 
the problem of unemployment. 

The idea of using the Eed Cross in social 
reorganization originated with Dr. Noeg- 
gerath. Professor of Children's Diseases in 
the University of Freiburg, who has been 
put in charge of the Belgian Red Cross work 
in Brussels. 

Thanks to the energy and ability of Dr. 
Noeggerath and his assistants, to use a po- 
lice expression, Brussels has been "cleaned 
up." He has organized and has running 
smoothly and effectively a "Magdalen 



68 



The Heel of War 



Home," a large creche for the babies of 
mothers who are employed by the day, two 
kindergartens, a school for social workers 
and an enormous headquarters building. He 
has organized a stocking-knitting industry 
which gives employment to 5,000 women ; a 
mail bag and knapsack industry which gives 
employment to 1,000 more, and he confi- 
dently expects to put some 15,000 other wo- 
men at work before Christmas. 

Besides this he has taken the Brussels 
lace-making industry under his wing, and is 
at present occupied in doing away with the 
middlemen by bringing together the hitherto 
sweated lace-maker and the lace merchant, 
so as to save for the former the unearned 
profit of the sweater. 

Dr. Noeggerath's ideas are to be followed 
in Poland, and he has been training the men 



Belgium 69 

who are to organize and administer a Polish 
Red Cross Society for the purpose. 

The American Relief Commission is still 
in charge of the distribution of supplies sent 
from this country for the help of needy Bel- 
gians. There can be no question but that the 
commission has done and is doing excellent 
work in relieving distress. 

Yet what is of almost as great importance 
to the happiness of the Belgians as food and 
clothing, is a good understanding with their 
conquerors. A year ago immediate food re- 
lief was of the first necessity, but to-day con- 
ditions have so greatly improved that it is 
possible for the authorities to look into the 
future. 

The members of the American Commis- 
sion have it in their pgwer to place the Bel- 
gians under still another great obligation by 
acting as the intermediaries between con- 



70 The Heel of War 

querors and conquered. A modus vivendi 
between the Germans and the Belgians of 
the capitalistic class is of the most vital im- 
portance to the Belgian people. Germany 
wants all Belgians to return, and, as far as 
possible, resume their workaday lives where 
they laid them down fourteen months ago. 
She believes that if the employers of labor 
will go back and accept the help of the Ger- 
man Government in opening up their fac- 
tories, more progress can be made toward 
the resumption of normal conditions than in 
any other way. For the good of the Belgian 
people what is chiefly needed is work, and 
a demand for labor can only be created by a 
return to usual conditions. 

It has been repeatedly charged that Bel- 
gians are not allowed to return to their own 
country, and that as there is no demand for 
manufactured goods there can be no possi- 



Belgium 71 

bility of opening the factories. Whatever 
may have been the case at the beginning of 
the war, at present Belgians are not only- 
permitted but urged to go home. There is 
demand in Germany for practically every- 
thing that Belgium can produce; in facty 
were the Belgian factories to resume, there 
can be no question that they would soon be 
running on full time. 

The members of our commission are in a 
better position to help Belgium than are any 
other body of men. It is probably beyond 
their power to establish a German-Belgian 
friendship, certainly at present, but if they 
would make the effort they would doubtless 
succeed in inducing the Belgians to meet 
German advances half way, and in so doing 
they would perform still another service for 
the people for whom they have already done 
so much. 



CHAPTER IV 

LOUVAIN 

Accounts of serious damage to city greatly exaggerated. 
No evidence of shell fire. Four Belgian versions of 
alleged wilful destruction of town. Official German 
version. Concerted attack by native villagers upon 
peaceful German soldiers. Coming of reinforce^ 
ments defeated purpose of Belgians. Houses were 
fired in order to smoke out the "snipers.** Catbe-^ 
dral and art treasures saved from fire by German 
soldiers. Stagnation of Antwerp, Loss of shipping 
interests. 

FROM Brussels we went to Louvain, 
half an hour distant, where we spent 
the afternoon. 
According to the second report of the Bel- 
gian Commission of Investigation, after the 
events of Aug. 25, 26, and 27, 1914, practi- 
cally all of the City of Louvain was de- 
stroyed, only the Town Hall and the railway 
station being left standing. 

As a matter of fact the German official 

72 



Louvain 7s 

statement that less than a sixth of the city 
was destroyed rather overstates than under- 
states the truth. 

The houses on both sides of the railway, 
before and after reaching the station, are in 
ruins, as well as those for two blocks on each 
side of the Rue de la Station, leading from 
the station to the Grand Place and imme- 
diately around the Cathedral. As we all 
know, the library has been destroyed and 
the roof of the Cathedral is considerably 
damaged by fire; otherwise the town is in- 
tact. 

One of the favorite postal card pictures of 
Louvain, which has been widely circulated, 
shows the Town Hall with its east fagade 
in ruins. This was evidently obtained by 
pointing the camera at the Town Hall across 
the debris of a house that had been blown up 
by dynamite to prevent the fire spreading to 



74 The Heel of War 

the Cathedral. The result of combining the 
debris and the Town Hall, and of fore- 
shortening the one so that the ruins are in 
the foreground of the other, is to make the 
debris appear to be a part of an apparently 
ruined building. 

This photograph is as inaccurate as is a 
sketch ^'from the description of an eye wit- 
ness," printed in one of the London illus- 
trated papers, showing a party of German 
officers drinking champagne in a motor car 
which stands in the Grand Place, while the 
Town Hall burns and German soldiers 
slaughter innocent women and children. 

Actually, and very oddly, the only injury 
done to the Town Hall was the decapitation 
of the only figure of a soldier on its f agade. 

I looked at the ruins of Louvain very 
carefully, and nowhere saw any evidence of 
shell fire. I saw no destruction that might 



Louvain 75 

not have been caused either by fire or dyna- 
mite, as claimed in the official German state- 
ment. The little city of Louvain, never un- 
der the most favorable circumstances very 
lively, seems to have resumed its normal life. 
There is a good deal of rebuilding going on, 
and I was informed that the university has 
been reopened. Feeling everywhere is so 
high upon the subject of the war that it is 
too soon for the world to agree upon what 
really did happen at Louvain. It may not, 
however, be without interest brieflv to sum- 
marize the different versions, official and 
otherwise, of the events of August 25, 1914. 
There are four Belgian versions, all of 
which have numerous supporters and all of 
which cannot possibly be true. According 
to the first Belgian version, the Germans, 
actuated by cruelty and blood lust, with- 
out any excuse or reason, simply '^shot 



76 The Heel of War 

up" the town. According to the second 
Belgian version, thoroughly frightened, 
but without cause, and thinking them- 
selves in peril of their lives, the Ger- 
mans opened fire on the defenseless popula- 
tion. According to the third Belgian ver- 
sion, the Germans, with hellish ingenuity, 
posted German soldiers in some of the 
houses, with orders to fire through the closed 
bKnds on passing German troops, so as to 
give the latter an excuse for destroying the 
city. According to the fourth Belgian ver- 
sion, which is the version favored by the 
Belgian Commission of Investigation, Ger- 
man soldiers fired on their own troops un- 
der the impression that the latter were Bel- 
gians, and when the mistake had been dis- 
covered, the German high command ordered 
the destruction of the town for the purpose 
of covering up the mistake of their own men 



Louvain 77 

and of slaking their blood thirst upon the 
innocent townspeople. 

The Germans have submitted their of- 
ficial version to the world, vdth a great 
number of affidavits from officers, non-com- 
missioned officers, and privates. As the Bel- 
gian side of the case has been given unlimit- 
ed space and the German side scarcely no- 
ticed, it may be well to state the latter at 
some length. 

This is the German story: * 

On August 19, 1914, the German Army 
entered Louvain and was received by the 
population with every evidence of friendli- 
ness. Nothing had occurred to alter the 
good relations which appeared to exist be- 

* I do not vouch for the German version, as so many- 
people seem to think, any more than I vouch for the 
four mutually contradictory Belgian versions. As I 
have said below, I submit all five versions ** with- 
out comment on their credibility or possibility. ' ' 



78 The Heel of War 

tween conqueror and conquered, when on 
the morning of August 25 the Belgian and 
English garrison of Antwerp attempted a 
sortie. There were left behind, almost as 
a matter of form, to guard the apparently 
well-disposed citizens of Louvain, a com- 
pany of Landsturm and a company of 
train troops, whose ammunition and sup- 
ply wagons were parked in the Great 
Square between the Town Hall and the 
Cathedral. 

At 7 P.M. the Landsturm company, which 
had been outside the northwest gate of the 
town, in the direction of Antwerp, was 
marched across the city to the square in 
front of the railway station, where it biv- 
ouacked for the night. As the troops passed 
through the streets they noticed a great num- 
ber of men and half -grown boys about, who, 
by the time they reached the railway sta- 



Louvain 79 

tion, had disappeared completely. As the 
Cathedral clock struck eight, a green rocket 
exploded over the town. Complete darkness 
followed immediately, caused by the cutting 
of the electric light wires. The clock had 
hardly stopped striking when from almost 
every house on the Station and Great 
Squares there began a fusillade from rifles, 
shotguns and mitrailleuses, most of the fir- 
ing coming from the upper floors. The fir- 
ing killed and wounded a nmnber of the 
soldiers, and stampeded the horses hitched 
to the supply and ammunition wagons. 

After the first surprise, the troops rallied 
and returned the fire of the snipers. At 
half -past 10 o'clock reinforcements came, 
and the German cause was saved by a bri- 
gade of infantry under the command of 
General von Boehn, 

Nevertheless, the firing from the houses 



80 



The Heel of War 



continued with undiminislied vigor. It 
became necessary to smoke the snipers out, 
house by house. Each house from which 
there was firing was set on fire, and as the 
snipers appeared they were killed unless 
they surrendered. If they surrendered with 
arms in their hands, or if in or under their 
civilian clothes there was found the metal 
tag of a Belgian soldier, they were at once 
shot. If, on the other hand, any one surren- 
dered without arms, or without a Belgian 
metal identification tag, he was put aside for 
trial later. 

No such prisoner was shot unless two Ger- 
man soldiers testified they had seen him with 
weapons in his hands. No woman was either 
shot or injured. It is absolutely denied that 
Bishop Coenraets was either shot or mo- 
lested, and it is insisted that he is living and 



Louvain si 

well at the home of Professor Dr. Toels at 
Firlen in Holland. 

As soon as the fires which had been start- 
ed to smoke out the snipers had done their 
work, the Germans turned their attention 
to preventing their spread to other quarters 
of the city. In doing this it became neces- 
sary to blow up a number of houses, espe- 
cially around the Town Sail and Cathedral. 
Despite this the roof of the Cathedral caught 
fire, and before it could be put out it had 
done great but not irreparable damage. The 
pictures of the Cathedral were saved at the 
risk of their lives by German soldiers, and 
placed in the Town Hall, where they may 
now be seen. 

It is said that at the university the libra- 
rian and his assistants all deserted their 
posts, locking the library behind them and 
carrying off the keys. It was not possible to 



82 



The Heel of War 



save either building or books, for when the 
doors were at last battered down the inte- 
rior had been gutted. The sniping contin- 
ued all through the night of the 25th, and 
through the 26th and 27th, and did not final- 
ly cease until the 28th. There were killed 
altogether about 100 Germans and about the 
same number of Belgians, including those 
executed after the fighting was over. 

The German explanation of the uprising 
in Louyain is very similar to their explana- 
tion of the uprisings in other Belgian cities, 
and is at the same time their explanation 
of the so-called atrocities. The Belgian 
press and Government had from the begin- 
ning of the war advocated and encouraged 
francs-tireurs, snipers and guerrillas, who 
were urged to kill, wound, and maim as 
many Germans as possible. In support of 
this statement the Germans submit a vast 



Louvain 83 

number of quotations from the Belgian 
newspapers and Government orders in ref- 
erence to the unorganized and ununif ormed 
*^ civic guards," their arms, and equipment. 
It is believed that the Belgian authorities 
expected the sortie from Antwerp on August 
25 to be successful, and through agents in 
Louvain organized a revolt among the citi- 
zens for the same night. It is claimed that 
the hand of the Government is seen in the 
great niunber of Belgian soldiers captured 
in Louvain wearing citizens' clothes, the 
service rifles in use, and the presence of 
mitrailleuses. 

When the townspeople saw the Landsturm 
company marching through the city from 
the direction of Antwerp, they thought the 
sortie had been successful and the troops 
were the head of the German retreat. They 
struck at an appointed signal under the im- 



84 The Heel of War 

pression that they would be able to destroy 
a demoralized and retreating enemy. Had 
they been correct in their surmise as to the 
success of the sortie they might have cut off 
the German retreat. As it was, they made a 
fatal error and paid the price of their mis- 
take. 

On the morning of August 26 the general 
in conmiand announced that if the sniping 
did not cease in forty-eight hours he would 
shell the town. When August 28 arrived, 
while the firing was not literally at an end, 
it had practically stopped. Because of this 
fact the bombardment of the city, which 
then took place, was purely technical. Four 
shells were fired into houses already in ruins, 
causing no loss of life and no further dam- 
age. These were the only shells fired by the 
Germans during the entire period of the 
fighting. 



Louvain 85 

When the fighting came to an end the in- 
cident was declared closed, and the people 
of Louvain once more took up the routine 
of their daily lives. 

These are the five prevalent versions of 
the happenings of August 25. I submit 
them without comment on their credibility 
or possibility. 

We went to Antwerp by the morning 
train on a Sunday, passing crowds of 
holiday makers at the way stations and in 
the villages en route, for the Belgian peas- 
ant has resumed his old life even to the en- 
joyment of his Sundays. On our way we 
ran close enough to Mechlin (Malines) to 
see the tower of the Cathedral as it stands 
silhouetted against the sky. It seems to have 
suffered severely from shell fire, for it is 
nicked and dented from top to bottom. Yet 
the darkness of the fighting about Mechlin 



86 



The Heel of War 



is brightened by at least one brilliant ex- 
ploit. 

The Cathedral had caught fire, and hope 
of saying it and its contents had been given 
up when Captain Graf Harrach, who in 
peaceful times is the well-known German 
sculptor, with a handful of his men, broke 
down the door and at the peril of his life 
cut down and carried to a place of safety 
Van Dyck 's masterpiece, ^ ' The Crucifix:ion. ' ' 
It is a satisfaction to know that the cap- 
tain's heroism was rewarded with the iron 
cross. 

As Antwerp is a fortress and on the fron- 
tier, almost as much formality is required 
on entering as is exacted on crossing the bor- 
der. A special pass is necessary, and all 
luggage is examined and all women are 
searched unless the central authorities de- 
cree otherwise. Antwerp shows more signs 



Louvain s? 

of the war than any other city we had visited 
since leaving France. It must be remem- 
bered that in ordinary times Antwerp de- 
rives the greater part of her prosperity 
from her commerce, and that before the war, 
next to that of Hamburg, her commerce was 
the greatest of any seaport on the Continent. 

Now that the war and the British have 
cut her off from the s6a, her commerce has, 
of course, ceased to exist. There are a few 
ships rotting in her harbor, her docks are 
deserted, and in her waterfront streets, once 
her pride, the grass grows six inches high. 
As in Brussels, the homes of the rich and 
prosperous are closed, for the well-to-do 
have preferred to remain away and spend 
their money abroad, rather than make the 
sacrifice to their pride and comfort of com- 
ing home to help their own people. 

Of the three hotels on the Place Verte, the 



88 



The Heel of War 



Europe was destroyed during the siege, the 
Saint Antoine is used by the General Staff, 
and only the Hotel de Plandre is available 
for strangers. This, however, more than 
meets the demand, for there is nothing to 
bring strangers to Antwerp. 

At the Musee Plantin, except for members 
of the Belgian Eelief Commission, we were 
the first outsiders who had been there for 
over a year. But for one solitary man, we 
were the only guests in the hotel, which had 
closed its kitchen because there had been 
no one for whom to cook. 

The town itself seems lively enough, hard- 
ly as much so as Brussels, and certainly not 
as much so as it used to be in happier days. 
But the shops are open, the coffee houses 
and restaurants crowded, and the streets 
and squares, especially on Sunday, full of 
citizens and German Landsturm soldiers in 



Louvain 89 

their field gray iinif orm, with their rifles 
in their hands. 

Considering the violence of the bombard- 
ment, which lasted almost continuously for 
forty-eight hours, and in that time reduced 
to submission what had been supposed to be 
an impregnable fortress, the damage done 
has been surprisingly slight. "While the 
man in the street will tell you that over 
2,000 houses were destroyed, the official Bel- 
gian estimate is that only 1,000 were in- 
jured. In this list has been included every 
house that was touched by a shrapnel bul- 
let or sustained the slightest damage, in- 
cluding broken windows, so that the number 
of demolished houses probably falls short 
of 500. 

These are scattered very widely over the 
central and southern parts of the city. No 
building of any importance has been in- 



90 



The Heel of War 



jured, and the Cathedral stands intact, al- 
though a picture postcard has been issued 
showing a part of the east end in ruins. 
This has been faked, as has the similar one 
in the case of the Town Hall at Louvain, 
by pointing the camera at the Cathedral 
across a heap of rubbish. 

The picture gallery was unhurt and is now 
open, although only the modem pictures are 
on exhibition, the old masters having been 
stored in the basement by the Belgians be- 
fore the bombardment began. 

As in Brussels, the Belgian director and 
his staff are in charge. The day we visited 
the gallery it was crowded, chiefly with Ger- 
man soldiers, who, unlike the soldiers one 
sees in most European galleries, seemed to 
be really and intelligently enjoying them- 
selves. St. Elizabeth's Hospital, which I 
had read had been destroyed by German 



Louvain 91 

shell fire, had evidently been injured at one 
corner, if fresh paint and plaster were any 
evidence of recent restoration. 

As at Louvain, almost everywhere that a 
house has been injured but not made unin- 
habitable, especially in the fashionable quar- 
ters of the town, the injury has been left 
unrepaired, sometimes apparently to the 
great inconvenience of the occupants. In 
fact, in most cases the injury has been made 
permanent, even at considerable trouble. 

Broken blinds have been nailed fast, so 
that the break will show without absolute- 
ly destroying the shutter, bullet holes have 
been carefully framed, and shattered panes 
of glass have been backed with sheets of 
plate glass, boards, or oiled paper, so as more 
or less to keep out the air, and at the same 
time display to all and sundry the ruin 
wrought by German guns. 



92 



The Heel of War 



Doubtless when the war is over the towns 
that have suffered will be able to reap a har- 
vest from American tourists by showing the 
actual ruin as it was originally wrought. 

The people of Antwerp do not seem as 
content or as cheerful as those of Brussels. 
While those I talked with were bitter 
against the rich Belgian refugees for not 
coming home, they were equally bitter 
against the Germans. They have lost their 
commerce through the war and have nothing 
else to take its place. Antwerp, from being 
one of the most active cities in Europe, has 
sunk to the status of a struggling provincial 
town. The Germans have done what they 
could to help unemployment, but thus far it 
has necessarily not been as much as at Brus- 
sels, although they hope later to accomplish 
much more. 

The people of Antwerp, like other Bel- 



Louvain 93 

gians, are allowed to wear the Belgian flag 
and the picture of their King in their but- 
tonholes, and read and circulate the Dutch 
papers and any French books they please. 
There is little indication that they have been 
placated, and everywhere we went out of 
sight of the Belgian municipal police we 
were greeted with hoots of ^* Sales Alle- 
mands," (*^ dirty Germans"), for, as we 
were the first tourists who seem to have been 
in Antwerp in a year, we were naturally 
taken for Germans. 

In leaving Antwerp the same formalities 
must be complied with as on entering. Un- 
less one has a special pass, baggage is once 
more examined, papers carefully rescruti- 
nized, and women searched. There is only 
one train a day leaving Antwerp for Hol- 
land, and that travels very slowly. So many 
spies cross and try to cross the frontier be- 



94 



The Heel of War 



tween Holland and Belgimn that every pos- 
sible precaution is taken to break up the 
spy traffic. 

There were a fair number of passengers 
on our train, but, thanks to the courtesy of 
the authorities, we were through with the 
formalities in less than five minutes. One 
changes trains at Eschen, with a delay of 
two hours, during which I watched our fel- 
low-passengers, all men, Hollanders, Bel- 
gians, and Germans, being examined. The 
examination was thorough, but very cour- 
teous, and no more severe than is that to 
which outgoing foreigners are subjected on 
leaving France. 

When the Dutch train was ready, we 
found our carriage had been kept for us by 
an exceedingly polite Prussian sergeant. 
To him we offered some boxes of cigarettes 
which had been left over from our last hos- 



Louvain 95 

pital visit. With, many excuses he ** begged 
leave to decline because he was on duty." 

The whistle blew and the train drew out 
from the station, boimd for the Dutch fron- 
tier, a quarter of a mile away. The last we 
saw of the conquerors' army of occupation 
was our polite sergeant, standing at atten- 
tion, with his hand at the salute. i 



CHAPTER V 

FRANCE SACRIFICES TO WIN 

No real hatred for Germany except among American 
colony and a small section of unrepresentative 
French, French people make many sacrifices for 
"La PatrieJ* Irritability in Government circles, 
French people kept in ignorance of real conditions. 
Establishment of oppressive dictatorship without 
consent of people or parliament, Viviani Ministry 
employs unconstitutional methods. Censorship aC" 
tive. No uncensored "war news** permitted from 
the front. No German newspapers allowed. All 
mail matter held up five days before leaving France. 

TO any one who knows France and 
has been there recently, by far the 
most impressive feature of the war 
is the spirit of the French people. Where- 
ever one goes, with whomsoever one talks, it 
is the same. There is a profound realization 
of the tragedy of the war, as of something 
as inevitable as fate, overpowering, almost 
overwhelming all peoples and nations alike. 

96 



France 97 

At first Frenchmen went to the war in the 
spirit of enthusiasm and conquest, for the 
recovery of the *4ost provinces" for which 
they had been preparing for over forty 
years. But they soon found that there was 
not as much desire on the part of the Alsa- 
tians to be ^^ recovered" as they had expected. 
Men have returned from Alsace with stories 
of wells poisoned by Alsatian farmers and 
of French sentries shot in the back by Alsa- 
tian peasants, and, moreover, Alsatian and 
Lotharingian troops have been fighting man- 
fully and loyally in Poland against Russia. 
All this served to damp the first enthusiasm, 
and as the months have gone by the phase 
of enthusiasm and conquest has entirely 
passed, for Frenchmen realize now that they 
are fighting for life. 

There is a grim determination through- 
out the country to win if victory is possible, 



98 



The Heel of War 



and if not to lose gloriously. There is 
among the people a calm, cheerful willing- 
ness to make any and every sacrifice of life, 
property, and even liberty for ^^La Patrie." 
One of the great surprises, and to their ene- 
mies one of the great disappointments, of 
the war has been the way in which the 
French people have refused to be stam- 
peded. 

It is true that in the beginning they be- 
came excited and that there was rioting in 
Paris, but there has never been any ques- 
tion of popular disapproval or even of dis- 
content with any of the burdens and hard- 
ships imposed by the war. There has never 
been any question of the ability and willing- 
ness of the civilians ^^to hold." If France 
is beaten it will be by force of arms from 
without, and not by revolution. Those Ger- 
mans who counted on internal disorders in 



France 99 

Trance as one of their allies already real- 
ize their mistake and acknowledge that the 
France of 1914 is a very different France 
from that of 1871. 

What greatly impresses any neutral who 
has lately seen much of English people is 
the difference in spirit between the English 
and the French. While the British upper 
and middle classes are thoroughly aroused* 
to the magnitude of the task before them, 
the people hardly realize its importance. In 
France, on the contrary, from the President 
to the smallest gamin, all appreciate the 
vastness of the undertaking upon which they 
have entered. 

While the British people are more or less 
apathetic, the hatred of the upper and mid- 
dle class English for the Germans is far 
greater than that of the Germans for them, 
while the French have no more hatred for 



100 The Heel of War 

their enemies than have the latter for the 
French. 

The English call their enemies ^^Huns," 
^* Pirates," and ^^ Murderers," the French' 
call them by no worse names than '^Les 
Boches," a contraction of ^^Alboche," the 
corruption of ^^Allemand," by which the 
Germans have been known for years in the 
extreme north of France. 

Neither the French soldiers nor those civil- 
ians who are in touch with the front through 
the presence there of sons, husbands, or 
brothers have anything but respect for their 
enemies. They realize that the Germans are 
fighting for what they believe to be the right, 
that it is no disgrace to be beaten by them, 
and that every skirmish won is a feat of 
arms of which to be greatly proud. 

The only real hatred of the Germans that 
seems to exist in France is among the mem- 



France loi 

bers of the American colony in Paris, who, 
like all foreigners living abroad, are for 
business and social reasons always more 
loyal than the King ; among a small section 
of the French people who have no relatives 
at the front, and who are inclined to believe 
everything they read in the French news- 
papers ; and among certain members of the 
bourgeois ruling oligarchy. 

It must be remembered that the Govern- 
ment and its immediate supporters have been 
under a terrific strain for over a year. It is 
therefore not surprising if the strain is be- 
ginning to tell on individuals so that many 
of them have become nervous, irritable and 
unjust. Not only are they unjust to their 
enemies, which is to be expected, but they 
seem unable even to be fair to neutrals. 

The Pope's suggestion that there might be 
something to be said on the side of the Ger- 



102 The Heel of War 

mans called forth a storm of abuse, with 
the absurd hint that he had been ^* bought 
by German gold," while President Wilson's 
neutrality, certainly not unfavorable to the 
Allies, was violently denounced in official 
quarters. He was charged with being pro- 
German because he had not declared war 
against Germany, and M. Clemenceau and 
M. Hanotaux, although not in office, support- 
ers of the Government, taking advantage of 
an indiscreet attack made upon the Presi- 
dent by an American stopping in Paris, went 
out of their way to abuse Mr. Wilson in the 
newspapers with which they are connected, 
L'Homme Enchaine and Le Figaro. 

As the war goes on this irritability in 
Government circles becomes more evident, 
and with it an ever-increasing objection to 
trusting the people. This is the more re- 
markable in view of the fact that since war 



Fran 



ce los 



was declared the French people have never 
proved themselves unworthy of any trust 
that has been given them. 

Before the battle of the Mame, the people 
were kept in ignorance of the real condition 
of affairs. It was not until they heard the 
sound of the German guns outside Paris that 
they knew that anything was wrong with the 
French Army. It is doubtful if any other 
people on earth would have stood the shock 
of the discovery as well as did the French. 
They took it perfectly quietly and bravely. 
Some who could do so left Paris, but most 
with admirable courage and patriotism re- 
mained. 

Again, when the much-advertised spring 
forward movement, which was to drive the 
Germans out of France and Belgium, ended 
in the disastrous defeat of Arras, in which 
100,000 Frenchmen were killed, wounded, 



104 The Heel of War 

and captured, the Government suppressed 
the news. After a week's time the news be- 
came public through the English papers and 
by word of mouth, and once more the French 
people stood the strain calmly and bravely. 

Yet even this second proof of French 
trustworthiness in adversity has produced 
no effect upon the Government. Strangely 
enough in a democracy, the members of the 
Ministry seem to distrust and fear the peo- 
ple, and they have distrusted and feared 
them from the very beginning. 

The war had hardly begun when the Gov- 
ernment, without either popular or Parlia- 
mentary consent, brushed aside the Consti- 
tution and the laws and established what is 
in effect, if not in name, a dictatorship as 
oppressive and as complete as any ever ex- 
ercised by either of the Napoleons. 

Germany declared war against France 



France 105 

on August 3, 1914. The French Parliament 
met the next day and, as required by the 
Constitution, recognized the existence of a 
state of war. In a single session, without 
amendment or debate, it enacted into law 
eighteen bills submitted by the Government, 
and authorized the President of the Repub- 
lic to borrow eight milliards of francs, to be 
spent upon the public services in any way 
the Government might see fit. It was per- 
fectly willing to subordinate itself to the 
executive, and in the face of national dan- 
ger legislate without comment on any sub- 
ject or in any way the Government might 
desire. 

This, however, did not satisfy the wishes 
of M. Viviani and his associates, who almost 
immediately after their flight to Bordeaux 
declared the session of Parliament closed by 
a notice printed in the Journal Officiel, It 



106 The Heel of War 

is not only insisted that the Government had 
no legal right to close a session of Parlia- 
ment held during ^^a state of siege," but it is 
further claimed that the only legal way that 
any session can be closed is by the reading of 
the decree of closure from the tribime of 
both chambers. 

As the budget for 1915 had not been voted, 
the Government was obliged to call Parlia- 
ment together again before the expiration 
of the year. This was not done until Decem- 
ber 24, when, after three meetings in which 
the chambers showed themselves as subser- 
vient and as pliant as before, the session was 
again closed in the same illegal way. 

On January 12, 1915, Parliament met un- 
der the Constitution for its regular session, 
which must last at least five months. Until 
lately it has at no time shown itself inclined 
to in any way embarrass the Government or 



France 107 

to disobey the latter 's orders, no matter how 
unconstitutional they might be. In fact, 
in two particulars, it has gone so far as even 
to surprise many Frenchmen who thorough- 
ly approve of the present dictatorship. 

The members of the French Senate are 
elected for nine years. In January of this 
year the terms of 102 Senators expired. 

'^It is difficult," said the Government, ^^to 
call together the electoral colleges, and in 
fact some of the departments affected are 
in the hands of the enemy. It will be even 
more inconvenient to have 102 seats vacant. 
Let us therefore ignore the Constitution and 
by a simple act of Parliament indefinitely 
extend the terms of those Senators who are 
about to go out"— which Parliament on De- 
cember 24, 1914, unanimously, and without 
a single word of debate, proceeded to do. 

In other words, one-third of the members 



108 The Heel of War 

of the French Senate have absolutely no 
constitutional right to their seats. The ex- 
tension of the life of the British House of 
Commons by act of Parliament is an en- 
tirely different matter, for the British Con- 
stitution, being unwritten, can be amended 
by act, so that anything not antagonistic to 
Magna Charta, the Bill of Eights, and the 
Act of Settlement is of itself constitutional. 

The French Constitution is written and 
rigid, yet the French Parliament, to save the 
Government from an inconvenience, for it 
was nothing more, did not hesitate to com- 
mit a constitutional violation, which in any 
but a Latin country would make null and 
void any future legislation it might enact, 
and even in France has raised the question 
of the validity of all legislation enacted dur- 
ing the present session. 

In the Chamber of Deputies an equally 



France 109 

extraordinary condition of affairs has been 
tolerated. Out of a membership of 603, 
more than one-third the total, or 220 Depu- 
ties, have been mobilized. Asked by the 
Committee on Leaves of Absence of the 
Chamber for a list of the members affected, 
the Minister of "War refused to furnish the 
desired information, and the Chamber ac- 
cepted his refusal. 

Curiously enough, two Under Secretaries 
of State, including the Under Secretary for 
Foreign Affairs, have been mobilized and 
are at the front, although continuing to hold 
office, and like the other Deputies with the 
colors, are never free from military disci- 
pline and can attend the meetings of the 
Chamber only by the permission of their 
military chiefs. If they were to attend with- 
out permission they would be liable to be shot 
for desertion "in the face of the enemy." 



110 The Heel of War 

A Deputy named Mirman, in his capacity 
of Deputy, signed a circular in praise of the 
Minister of War, and was promptly pun- 
ished as a private soldier for having taken 
part in politics. By a recently enacted law, 
Deputies, formerly forbidden to do so, may 
now accept decorations. It is very easy to 
see that through the fear of punishment, the 
hope of reward and the force of discipline, 
the Minister of War can and does absolutely 
control over a third of the Chamber of 
Deputies. 

Acting under Government orders, Parlia- 
ment has made a third of the membership of 
one house unconstitutional and imperiled the 
validity of all legislation, and in the other 
has permitted more than a third of its mem- 
bership to become the private property of 
the War Department. Surely it would seem 
that a Parliament willing to go as far as 



France iii 

this in obeying orders might have been 
trusted to any extent. 

Yet such apparently has not been the case, 
for the Viviani Ministry has preferred to 
employ even more unconstitutional methods 
of government to trusting the Chambers. It 
has reverted to the methods of the Second 
Empire, and ever since the war began, in 
direct violation of both statute law and Con- 
stitution, France has been governed by Min- 
isterial decree. 

According to Professor J. Barthelemy of 
the Faculty of Law in the University of 
Paris (^^Du Eenforcement du Pouvoir Ex- 
ecutif en Temps de Guerre") these execu- 
tive decrees have been of three kinds : 

1. Those formally suspending existing 
statutes ; 

2. Those directly violating existing laws ; 
and 



112 The Heel of War 

3. Those substituting rules decreed by the 
executive power for laws already enacted by 
Parliament. 

It is needless to say that none of these 
decrees has either legal authority or moral 
justification. In a very few instances Par- 
liament has subsequently legalized decrees ; 
otherwise they have continued to be, as in 
the beginning, absolutely illegal. 

The most illegal example of existing law 
suspended by Ministerial decree cited by 
Professor Barthelemy is that of the law 
against *^ congregations of women.'' Under 
the so-called ^'Combes" laws religious asso- 
ciations of women, as well as those of men, 
were declared illegal, and the nuns who had 
done so much, so faithfully and so nobly, 
for France, in education and in caring for 
the sick and poor, were expelled from the 
country and their property seized. 



France 113 

When the war broke out the Government 
awoke to the fact that the only trained 
nurses (the nuns) that France had ever 
known were forbidden to enter the countiy. 
Accordingly, instead of asking Parliament 
to amend or suspend the law against congre- 
gations, which would have been the legal 
procedure and which request Parliament 
would undoubtedly have promptly granted, 
the law' was suspended for the duration of 
the war by Ministerial decree. The Govern- 
ment had no more legal right to suspend the 
law than had the first passerby in the street. 

Under the second and third heads, viola- 
tion of existing laws by decree, and substitu- 
tion of decrees for laws, for both mean prac- 
tically the same thing, the examples are so 
numerous that only a few of the most glar- 
ing can be mentioned. 

Under the law, no official, either civil or 



114 The Heel of War 

military, can be deprived of Ms office or Ms 
rank without the authority of a properly 
constituted council of discipline. This has 
been brushed aside by the decrees of August 
15 and September 10, 1914, placing every 
employe of Government, from the general in 
command of groups of armies to the messen- 
ger boys in the civil departments, at the 
mercy of their MerarcMcal cMefs, in most 
cases a single individual, who, without ap- 
peal, may remove, suspend, or degrade any 
or all subordinates. 

Under the law no court-martial, wMch 
must consist of five officers, can try a pris- 
oner, either civil or military, without a cer- 
tain delay, nor inflict the death penalty with- 
out a delay sufficient to permit an appeal. A 
decree (September 6, 1914) substitutes for 
the legal court of five a court of three mem- 
bers, and permits them to try, condemn and 



France 115 

execute a prisoner, either civil or military, 
without any delay whatever. The prisoner 
is not only tried for his life by a court of il- 
legal constitution, but is deprived of his 
right of appeal. Surely even Eussia and 
Turkey, at their worst, have gone no further 
than this. 

The law provides only one method for the 
removal of Mayors ; that is by Presidential 
decree, the vacancy thus created to be filled 
by the election of the Municipal Council, 
unless there is an official charged with the 
f imctions of Vice-Mayor. JYet in many de- 
partments the Prefects have removed May- 
ors and appointed their successors, and 
where they have not approved of the May- 
ors' conduct have even suspended them, with 
as much legal right as the Sheriff of Steuben 
County would have to remove the Mayor of 
New York. 



116 The Heel of War 

The Constitution provides that in case of 
a vacancy in the Chamber of Deputies the 
Executive shall order a special election with- 
in three months. Tet a decree of August 7, 
1914, indefinitely postponed all such special 
elections. 

By the decree of January 1, 1915, the Ex- 
ecutive forbade for all time the sale of ab- 
sinthe and the opening of new places for 
the sale of alcoholic drinks. This was new 
legislation of a most radical kind, repealing 
the existing law and substituting a new law 
in its place, not for the duration of the war, 
but indefinitely. 

Using Article IX of the obsolete law of 
August 9, 1849, which permitted the military 
authorities during a "state of siege" to for- 
bid publications and meetings tending to 
excite disorder, and the law of August 4, 
1914, which punishes indiscreet publications 



France 117 

of a military nature, the Government has 
decreed a censorship the like of which the 
world has never known. 

No new newspaper may be started without 
the permission of the censorship. Of exist- 
ing newspapers only one daily edition may 
be issued, no *^ scare heads" or ^^ display 
type" may be used, no newspaper may be 
** cried"* in the streets." Every word that is 
printed must first be passed by the Censor, 
on pain of the suspension or suppression of 
the newspaper. No criticism of any one in 
authority, either civil or military, is allowed, 
nor may any military news be printed that 
is not passed by Headquarters. 

Some of the vagaries of the Censor would 
strike any people but the Latins as, to say 
the least, amusing. For many weeks The 
London Times was not allowed in France, 
because it was supposed to print news un- 



118 The Heel of War 

favorable as well as favorable to the Allies, 
nor for the same reason were the newspa- 
pers allowed to print tbe British official bul- 
letins. Of course, no German newspapers 
are allowed to enter Prance, although 
French and English newspapers may be ob- 
tained in any large city in Germany. The 
climax was capped when the newspapers 
were forbidden to print the weather predic- 
tions, on the ground that they might furnish 
valuable information to the enemy. To any 
one who has ever followed French weather 
predictions, which do not come right once in 
a hundred times, the force of this censorship 
rule does not appear. 

All mail matter is held up by the Censor 
for five days before being permitted to leave 
France, and both inward and outward bound 
mail is liable to be opened, although there is 
no authority in law for the proceeding. 



France 119 

Thus far there has been no popular pro- 
test against the dictatorship of the Viviani 
Government. The French people are so de- 
termined to win that they are willing to make 
any sacrifice to do so. They have been told 
so constantly that victory will be impossible 
without the temporary loss of political lib- 
erty that they have begun to believe that it 
is so. 

In our sense of the term, the French Ee- 
public has always been undemocratic, for, 
thanks to the absence of great parties, and 
to the group system, thanks to a strongly 
centralized and bureaucratic Government, it 
has been possible for a self-perpetuating 
bourgeois oligarchy to rule the republic un- 
disturbed. Changes of Ministry merely 
mean changes in the individuals constituting 
the Government without any important 
change in principles or policies. There is, 



120 The Heel of War 

therefore, in Parliament, no effective oppo- 
sition and Ministers live and fall by the 
force of temporary combinations of a num- 
ber of Parliamentary groups. 



CHAPTER VI 

DISAFFECTION WITH VIVIANI MINISTRYi * 

The illegal status of the ruling ministry. Praise of 
General Jofire. French politicians criticise British 
tactics, France has no more men for the army. 
Fall of Calais and seizure of Suez Canal means end 
of war, Creusot blunder and exoneration of Gen= 
eral Joffre, Fear of "war dictatorship'' being re= 
tained after peace is declared. Should Germany 
win, she will find it to her interests to preserve the 
French republic intact, 

THE present Viviani Ministry, con- 
trary to all precedents, was formed 
wMle Parliament was not in ses- 
sion. It came into existence August 26, 1914, 
and governed until December 24, without re- 
ceiving even the indirect approval of the 
Chambers. All its members belong to the 

* Since this chapter was written the Viviani Min- 
istry has resigned and M. Briand has become Prime 
Minister, with General Gallieni as Minister of War 
and therefore General Joffre 's superior. 

121 



122 The Heel of War 

ruling oKgarchy, although professing va- 
rious shades of opinion. M. Guesde is a So- 
cialist, M. Eibot is comparatively conserva- 
tive, while M. Briand is an ex-Syndicalist, 
and M. Viviani an ex-Socialist. 

It is needless to say that were General 
Joffre not in complete sympathy with the 
oligarchy he would not hold his present 
rank. Like his political associates, he is a 
bourgeois, and an extreme radical, and every 
step he has made in recent years has been 
due to the caste of which he is a member. 

Much display is made of his absolute im- 
partiality and of the fact that the Marquis 
de Castelnau, a member of the old aristoc- 
racy, commands a group of armies. Except 
for that of General de Castelnau, however, 
one looks in vain among the names of high 
commanding officers for the ^'particule," as 
the French call it, the ^*de," which is sup- 



Disaffection ns 

posed to indicate aristocratic birth. There 
is no reason why General Jo&e and his as- 
sociates should not prefer their own class 
for high command, and, in fact, they would 
be very unwise were they to give military 
power to any but men in whom they had 
every confidence. 

The dictatorship has made itself as secure 
as possible in the belief, so say its support- 
ers, that this is the only way of accomplish- 
ing the gigantic task which confronts it, for 
it fully realizes the seriousness of the pres- 
ent military situation. No well-informed 
member of either Chamber has any illusions 
about the allies of France. 

These members profess to imderstand 
fully the motives that brought Italy into 
the war; in fact, they are scarcely just in 
speaking of her, when it is remembered that 



124 The Heel of War 

Italy would probably be at peace but for 
the efforts of England and Prance. 

Tbey are convinced that if Italy can un- 
aided conquer the territory upon which she 
has set her heart she will at once make a 
separate peace with Austria. In proof of 
their theory they point to Italy's unwilling- 
ness to sign the agreement by which France, 
Russia and Great Britain have pledged 
themselves not to make any separate xoeace 
with the enemy, and express the hope that 
sooner or later Italy will be obliged to come 
to Paris and London for money, when terms 
will be enforced binding her to her allies 
until the end of the war.* 

The feeling of French politicians toward 
England strikes a neutral as being very un- 
fair. They concede the immense service 

* Siaee the above was written Italy has signed the 
agreement not to make a separate peace. 



Disaffection 125 

Great Britain has done the Allies in holding 
the seas and in lending them money, but 
they are openly and severely critical of the 
British Army. There are on the Continent 
not more than 800,000 Englishmen, and this 
number, it is said, can never be surpassed. 
In proportion to the length of front held by 
the French the British are holding about 
one-quarter of what^ they should hold. 
While great admiration is expressed for the 
British '^ Tommy" and for the bravery of 
his officers, the latter are freely called igno- 
rant and incompetent. 

It is claimed that again and again the 
British Army has been saved from defeat 
only by the timely help of French troops. 

The thus far complete failure of the Dar- 
danelles campaign is attributed entirely to 
British incompetence. It is said that the 
French were misled by the British naval au- 



126 The Heel of War 

thorities into imdertakiiig what was from 
the military point of view an impossible 
task, on the assmnption that it could be ac- 
complished in a few days or, at the utmost, 
weeks. Now that it is under way it can 
never be abandoned, even if the fighting con- 
tinues until the end of the war. 

The only hope of success, certainly in the 
immediate future, lies in a flanking move- 
ment through Bulgaria, which can, of 
course, only be accomplished with the lat- 
ter 's consent. Thus far that very wily indi- 
vidual, King Ferdinand, and his advisers 
have resisted all the inducements, both finan- 
cial and territorial, offered by the Allies for 
the abandonment of Bulgarian neutrality. 

The seriousness of the fall of Warsaw is 
perfectly understood by the rulers of 
France. Much emphasis is laid on the Rus- 
sian declaration that the loss of the entire 



Disaffection 127 

Kingdom of Poland is of no moment, and 
that in due time they will drive out the Ger- 
mans, but this is merely for the benefit of 
the public. Thinking Frenchmen know that 
the fall of the Polish capital is the most dis- 
astrous blow that the Allies have suffered 
since the war began. Prom the strategical 
point of view the loss of Belgium was of 
very great importance, but the loss of War- 
saw is even more vital, not only strategically, 
but morally and politically. 

It is obvious that von Hindenburg, hav- 
ing accomplished the purpose of his year- 
long campaign, in reducing Poland and 
Courland, will decline the invitation of the 
Russians to follow their weakened and more 
or less demoralized army into the heart of 
Russia, and, securing his conquests from 
Riga to Sokal, will, for the present at least, 
be content to hold them. Even the English 



128 The Heel of War 

concede that for some months to come Ens- 
sia will be a negligible quantity. If it is true 
that the Central Empires have some three 
million troops on the eastern front, the de- 
feat of Eussia will release f uUy two million 
for other purposes. Germany will have at 
her disposal nearly two million victorious 
and seasoned troops, probably as good fight- 
ing material as the world has ever known. 

Like the troops who followed Napoleon, 
the army of von Hindenburg has implicit 
faith in its commander. It has been checked, 
but never defeated, and from Tannenberg to 
Warsaw it has won a series of victories far 
greater in extent and immediate importance 
than any in history. The psychological ef- 
fect of belief in its invincibility is to make 
an army invincible. Von Hindenburg 's 
army, or rather armies, believe that they are 
unconquerable, and, with the greatest gen- 



Disaffection 129 

eral the war has yet produced at their head, 
it may very well be that they are right. 

In view of the fact that, except for the 
boys under 18, France has almost reached 
the end of her resources in men, and that 
the English reinforcements have been dis- 
appointing in quantity and quality, the ques- 
tion which interests the Allies to the point of 
extreme nervousness is", '^ What will be done 
with this vast army ready to be released^" 

All or part of it may be used in a drive 
against Calais. In the latter event, now that 
the road is open to Constantinople, the part 
not used against Calais may be used to bring 
Riunania to terms, or what is much more 
likely employed in a campaign against the 
Suez Canal and Egypt. Should Calais fall 
and the Suez Canal be seized, in all human 
probability the end of the war will be in 
sight. 



130 The Heel of War 

It has been said that the three main pur- 
poses of German strategy have been the cap- 
ture of Warsaw, of Calais, and of Paris. 
The first has been accomplished. If the fate 
of Calais should be that of Warsaw, Ger- 
many will never need to march on Paris, 
for as far as France is concerned, the war 
will be at an end. 

It will thus be seen that the ruling oli- 
garchy in France, when it faces outward, 
looks upon a sky clouded with uncertainty 
and doubt. Nor when it faces inward is its 
horizon altogether clear. 

Recently there has developed in the 
Chamber of Deputies a certain amount of 
unrest under the Government's rule, which 
has suggested a growing disposition to re- 
volt against the dictatorship. So much has 
this been the case that the Government has 
not dared to dismiss the Chambers by de- 



Disaffection 131 

cree, as it did in August and December of 
last year, and Parliament has been sitting 
continuously since January. At the end of 
July of tMs year, at what we should call a 
caucus of the different Parliamentary 
groups, it was unanimously resolved that 
each standing committee of the Chamber 
should through one of its members keep in 
touch with the governmental department to 
which the committee is accredited. For ex- 
ample, the representative of the Standing 
Committee on Public Health is to keep him- 
self informed as to how the Government is 
handling the sanitary features of the war, to 
report from time to time to his committee, 
which in turn is to report to the Chamber. 

There has been a great deal of curiosity 
and much speculation as to who is responsi- 
ble for the sudden display of independence 
in the Chamber. Some say that its author is 



132 The Heel of War 

Aristide Briand, present Minister of Justice 
and former Prime Minister, and that its 
purpose is the displacement of the Viviani 
clique in favor of M. Briand and his friends. 

There are others who believe that the 
legislative revolt has been organized by the 
enemies of General Joffre, with the hope 
that by overthrowing the Ministry they may 
substitute for him as General in Chief either 
Gallieni, the Military Governor of Paris, or 
Foch, who commands one of the groups of 
armies. 

While this explanation is possible, it is 
hardly probable. Although there has lately 
been considerable criticism of the Com- 
mander in Chief for not having accom- 
plished more against the Germans, he seems 
to have retained public confidence. 

The policy of the Ministry has been to 
suppress as far as possible the names of all 



Disaffection 133 

officers in high command but that of Joffre. 
As M. Millerand, the War Minister, said, 
with great self-satisfaction, ^^This has been 
and will be, as far as we are concerned, an 
anonymous war." In other words, the Gov- 
ernment is avoiding as much as possible the 
risk of an appearance of a ^^man on horse- 
back" who might overthrow their colleague, 
General Joffre, in the popular fancy and 
give them infinite trouble. 

The consequence has been that, with the 
exception of that of the Commander in 
Chief, the people know the names of scarcely 
any of their generals. It is possible that 
General Joffre might be improved upon, but, 
thanks to the policy of the Govenunent, his 
successor would suffer from the handicap 
of not being knowQ to the public — a terrible 
weakness in modern France. 

Undoubtedly General Joffre has been held 



134 The Heel of War 

responsible for much, for wMch lie is in no 
way to blame. For example, at the outbreak 
of the war all the employes of the Creusot 
arms and ammunition factories were mobi- 
lized and sent to the front, so as to show that 
the republic makes no difference between in- 
dividuals. At length, when it was found that 
the Creusot works could not be run by old 
men, women, and children, when they had 
practically shut down, the Ministry sent 
hither and thither to find the former work- 
men. 

Those who had not been killed or captured 
by the enemy were returned to the factory, 
whence they should never have been taken. 
In Germany all the hands at the Krupp 
works and all the former hands who could 
be found were mobilized for work at the fac- 
tory, where they are serving Germany quite 



Disaffection 135 

as effectively as though they were in the 
trenches. 

General Joffre has been held to blame for 
the Creusot blunder, although undoubtedly 
it was a political play of the Minister of 
War. In the same way he has been most 
unjustly charged with having ordered the 
disastrous drive into Alsace at the begin- 
ning of the war, which again was due to the 
personal initiative of the then War Min- 
ister. 

It is probable that the real cause of the 
Parliamentary revolt is far more creditable 
than the insinuations of the supporters of 
the dictatorship suggest. There is a very 
general feeling among Frenchmen who 
know the situation that the dictatorship has 
gone far enough. While thinking men in 
France submitted uncomplainingly to the 
iron hand of the Viviani Ministry in the 



136 The Heel of War 

early days of the war, under the impression 
that it was a national necessity, now that 
the nation has adapted herself to war condi- 
tions they are beginning to realize that if 
she is capable of maintaining Parliamen- 
tary government in time of peace she is ca- 
pable of maintaining it in time of war. 

Moreover, a war dictatorship contains the 
possibility of untold danger on the return 
of peace. They argue that if the Constitu- 
tion and laws are to be laid aside in time 
of war because the Ministry honestly be- 
lieves a dictatorship to be in the best inter- 
ests of the nation, is it not possible that the 
Ministry may honestly believe it to be in 
the best interests of the nation to continue 
the dictatorship after the war is over? 

Why, then, run the risk of imperiling the 
republic when the risk may be avoided by 
reasserting and reemploying the constitu- 



Disaffection 137 

tional powers of Parliament? Deputies 
concede that should Germany win she would 
probably find it in her interests to preserve 
the French Republic. But this would be a 
fearful price to pay for the continuance of 
republican institutions. They hope and ex- 
pect that France will win, and therefore be- 
lieve it to be their patriotic duty to insure 
as far as possible the existence of the repub- 
lic rather than court the danger of its pos- 
sible overthrow at the hands of a Govern- 
ment less scrupulous than that now in pow- 
er, supported by a victorious army. 



CHAPTER VII 

ITALY'S ATTITUDE TOWARD THE WAR 

Italian vacillation and uncertainty as to course of ac= 
tion. Her strength not equal to her political am= 
bitions. Italy remained neutral only so long as it 
served her interests to do so. The *'break'* with 
Austria=Hungary, The failure of Von Bulow's 
negotiations. Resulting *'deadlock'* with Central 
Empires, Sonino*s radical alteration of Italy's for= 
eign policy. Italy joins forces with the Allies, 

DUEING the weeks wMch preceded 
her declaration of war Italy passed 
through a series of experiences 
which, from our point of view, were so con- 
tradictory, so extraordinary, and so essen- 
tially Italian that they would have been al- 
most impossible anywhere else. 

The overwhelming majority known to ex- 
ist in the Chamber of Deputies in favor of 
the preservation of neutrality changed al- 
most over night into a nearly unanimous 

138 



Italy 



139 



vote in favor of hostilities, and the Salandra 
Ministry, apparently friendless one day, was 
enthusiastically acclaimed the next. From 
having been willing and anxious to keep the 
peace, provided that in so doing her national 
aspirations could be gratified, Italy has re- 
versed herself and become an enthusiastic 
advocate of ^^La guerra per la guerra," or 
war for war's sake. 

The great difference in method which ex- 
ists between us English-speaking peoples on 
the one hand and the rest of the world on 
the other is that we always like to gild the 
pill of political deceit with the gloss of fine 
words, with what Bismarck used to call *Hhe 
English phrases about humanity," while the 
others, the Teutons very often, and the Lat- 
ins usually, seek to accomplish their pur- 
pose with neither concealment nor excuse. 

The consequence is that an act which 



140 The Heel of War 

seems perfectly natural and proper to a Lat- 
in because dictated by what he considers 
national necessity, may seem to us to be 
sordid, cynical, and selfish. 

It is very likely that we might have done 
the same thing, but instead of proclaiming it 
frankly as the gratification of national am- 
bition we explain that we have acted only 
from the highest motives. 

Thus, while Prance seized Morocco, Ger- 
many Belgium, and Italy Tripoli, because 
they required, or thought they required, the 
conquered territory, and boldly said so, 
England seized South Africa and we seized 
Panama in the loudly proclaimed interests 
of the people whom we seized. 

The most remarkable feature of our meth- 
od is that, while in following it we deceive 
no one else, we most successfully deceive 
ourselves, so that we really believe that we 



Italy 



141 



are unselfish, and view with genuine dis- 
tress the selfishness of others. The truth of 
the matter is that when we do a mean act, 
we at least have the grace to be ashamed 
of it, and try to excuse ourselves as best we 
may. 

In discussing Italy's recent foreign policy 
common fairness requires that we should do 
so from the Italian point of view and not 
from our own, and we should try to judge 
what has recently happened in Italy by Ital- 
ian standards and not by the standards 
which we have set up for our own guidance, 
but which alas! we follow all too hesitat- 
ingly. 

It must be remembered that Italy has late- 
ly felt the infiuence of the spirit of nation- 
ality quite as much as has any other nation. 
For the completion of her nationality her 
people have already made great sacrifices 



142 The Heel of War 

and are ready to make many more. Her 
national ambitions are similar to those of 
every other comitry on earth, and we should 
be the last to condemn in her what we hold 
in honor among ourselves. 

She wishes to become great and powerful, 
and like every other state worthy of exist- 
ence looks forward to the day when she will 
dominate the world. 

But economically her strength does not 
equal her ambitions. A constantly increas- 
ing population requires more and ever more 
employment and food, and neither employ- 
ment nor food has kept pace with the num- 
ber of arms that are willing to work nor 
with the number of mouths needing to be 
fed. 

The surplus population has had to go 
abroad in very large numbers, and besides 
these there are some six hundred thousand 



Italy 



143 



so-called ^* unredeemed" Italians living in 
the adjoining provinces of Austria. Under 
the theory of nationality every Italian living 
beyond the jurisdiction of the flag is a di- 
rect political and economic loss to Italy. 

Italian nationality can never be complete 
imtil the neighboring Italians are covered 
by the flag and until white men's colonies 
are acquired, to which Italian emigration 
can be directed, for Tripoli does not seem to 
answer the purpose it was intended to serve. 

Only when Italian nationality has been 
completed can colonies be acquired beyond 
the seas; in other words, can the work of 
Italian world empire building be begun. 
Only when the Italian nation has been 
achieved and when every pair of Italian 
arms has been saved to Italy will the eco- 
nomic strength of the nation be sufficient 
for world conquest. 



144 The Heel of War 

The theory, of course, contains contradic- 
tions, for only the extreme Irredentists se- 
riously believe that either Malta, Savoy, 
Nice, Corsica, or Ticino can ever be re- 
deemed, nor have any Italians as yet advo- 
cated the ^'redemption" of their fellow-coun- 
trymen in North and South America. The 
doctrine of Italian redemption applies only 
to the Italian provinces of Austria-Hun- 
gary. 

When the war broke out last August the 
Italian people at once realized the possibil- 
ity of turning it to their advantage, and did 
not hesitate to announce their intention of 
making it serve '^i nostri interessi" — ''our 
interests" — ^which meant that they proposed 
to acquire a maximum of the spoils of war 
with a roininaum of effort. 

In this great world war of selfishness and 
greed, in which each country, except wretch- 



Italy 



145 



ed Belgium, is fighting for its own hand, 
Italy should not be blamed for doing what 
all the rest have done, nor should she be criti- 
cised for openly announcing her purpose as 
none of the rest have been willing to do. 

Italian statesmen have never forgotten 
that Machiavelli was the first to preach the 
modern doctrine of Italian nationality. 
And so in making a reality of the splendid 
dreams of the great Florentine they have 
never hesitated to employ the methods which 
he advocated. 

There is an almost childlike simplicity in 
the Italian character which causes Italians 
to be rather proud of motives which we 
should conceal, even though they were based 
on apparent necessity. And when the in- 
terests of La Patria are involved Italians 
frankly insist that any means and any meth- 
ods are justified for their defense. In our 



146 The Heel of War 

hearts we may quite agree with the Italian 
idea, but we are always loath to acknowledge 
that we are willing to serve our country by 
morally equivocal means. 

Signor Sonino set himself the task of 
making the best possible bargain for Italy 
by playing the belligerents against each 
other. As Italy was utterly unprepared for 
war, time was absolutely essential, and time 
she has gained. 

How well the Government has employed 
the last nine months will only be shown 
when the Italian Army actually takes part 
in the fighting. It is certain, however, that 
both the Central Empires and the Allies have 
believed the services of Italy well worth 
bidding for. 

Italy was undoubtedly justified in remain- 
ing neutral at the outbreak of the war; for 
the terms of the Triple Alliance only re- 



Italy 



147 



quired her to fight in the event of an attack 
upon one of the contracting parties. It is, 
moreover, extremely doubtful if the Italian 
people would have submitted to a war on 
behalf of their hereditary enemy, Austria. 
For the moment both belligerents were, or 
rather had to be, satisfied, for Italy might 
have taken a position far less favorable to 
either one or the other. ^ 

As long as Marchese di San Giuliano oc- 
cupied the Foreign Office, it seemed as 
though Italy would in good faith preserve 
neutrality, with the intention of playing 
*Hhe honest broker" at the close of the war 
and of demanding compensation for her 
services. 

When early last winter Marchese di San 
Giuliano died and was succeded by Barone 
Sidney Sonino, Italy's foreign policy was 
radically altered. Sonino, who is half an 



148 The Heel of War 

Englishinan, with more or less strongly de- 
veloped pro-Britisli sympatMes, at once 
abandoned San Giuliano's course and began 
an aggressive diplomatic campaign against 
Austria-Hungary. The history of his activ- 
ity is contained in the recently published 
*^Libro Verde," or ^^Grreen Book," which is 
one of the most illuminating existing com- 
mentaries on present-day Italian political 
methods and practices. 

On December 9, 1914, Sonino instructed 
the Italian Ambassador at Vienna to call the 
attention of Count Berchtold, the Austro- 
Hungarian Minister of Foreign Affairs, to 
what Sonino claimed was a serious breach 
of the terms of Article VII of the treaty re- 
newing the Triple Alliance. 

While the treaty of the Triple Alliance has 
never been published, the many references 
to Article VII in the ^'Libro Verde" clearly 



Italy 



149 



show its purport. It is obvious that it 
proTided that should Austria-Hungary at 
any time permanently occupy any territory 
in the Balkan States, Italy should, in return, 
receive territorial compensation from Aus- 
tria-Hungary. 

Although Italy had declared her neutral- 
ity on August 3, 1914, and although Aus- 
tria-Hungary had entered Serbia almost im- 
mediately after the declaration of war, it 
was not until four months later (December 
9, 1914) that the Italian Government saw 
fit to ask compensation for that permanent 
occupation of a part of Serbia which the 
Dual Monarchy had evidently intended from 
the beginning.* 

Sonino's dispatch of December 9 is certain- 

* On Aug. 25, 1914, Marchese di San Giuliano stated 
that * ' it would now be premature to speak of compen- 
sations" (Annex I of Libro Verde). 



150 The Heel of War 

ly admirable for its frankness. It contains 
no **fine phrases about humanity," but goes 
ivith brutal and cynical directness straight 
to the point. 

The substance of it is that under Article 
VII it was agreed that if Austria-Himgary 
wished to seize Balkan territory Italy must 
receive compensation in Austro-Hungarian 
territory. That without previous consulta- 
tion with her ally, Italy, the Dual Monarchy 
had entered Serbia with the evident purpose 
of remaining permanently, and that Italy 
had received nothing in return. If she 
wished to receive a free hand in Serbia, 
from Italy, she must meet Italian demands. 

Count Berchtold was at first not inclined 
even to discuss the question of the alleged 
breach of Article VII, but consented to do 
so in a half-hearted way when urged by Herr 



Italy 



151 



Jagow, the German Minister of Foreign Af- 
fairs. 

On December 16 Prince von Biilow ar- 
rived in Eome and at once began Ms bril- 
liant but hopeless efforts to bring together 
Germany's two colleagues in the Triple Al- 
liance. According to the **Libro Verde,'' 
Prince von Biilow agreed with Barone So- 
nino that Article VII h^d been violated and 
at last induced Austria-Himgary to discuss 
seriously the question of compensation. 

Baron Burian, who succeeded Count 
Berchtold, at first suggested that Italy's oc- 
cupation of the Dodecanese and Valona was 
sufficient compensation to meet the require- 
ments of the case. Italy replied that she 
must veto aU Austro-Hungarian military ac- 
tivities in the Balkans until the question of 
compensation had been decided, and that the 
compensation must be in Austro-Hungarian 



152 The Heel of War 

territory. At last Prince von Biilow told 
Sonino that lie had advised Austria-Hun- 
gary ^Ho give to Italy at the close of the 
war Italian Trentino." Sonino replied that 
the cession of territory must be made at once, 
whereupon Biilow succeeded in having the 
question of the time of cession postponed 
until after the amount of cession had been 
determined. 

Then followed a long period of haggling, 
each side trying to overreach the other and 
to gain time, neither side being willing to 
come to a definite understanding. Italy was 
evidently unwilling to announce her irredu- 
cible minimum of demand, while Austria- 
Hungary was equally unwilling to announce 
her absolute maximum of concession. 

Finally, on March 27, Baron Burian of- 
fered in return for a perfectly free hand in 
the Balkans to cede to Italy at the close of 



Italy 



153 



the war Southern Tirol, including the city 
of Trento. To which, on April 8, Barone 
Sonino replied with a counter-proposition, 
which provided for the immediate cession 
of Trentino, as it belonged to the Napoleonic 
Kingdom of Italy in 1811, Gradiska, and 
Gorz, and six groups of islands off the Dal- 
matian coast ; Trieste and its province, with 
Istria as far south as Pirano to at once be- 
come a free and independent state, Austria 
to recognize Italian sovereignty over Valona 
and its hinterland, and to give Italy a free 
hand in Albania. 

In return for which Italy offered to give 
Austria-Hungary a free hand in the Bal- 
kans, to preserve strict neutrality toward 
both her aUies, and to pay Austria-Hungary 
two hundred million lire in settlement of all 
property, debts, claims, etc., of and by the 
ceded provinces. 



154 The Heel of War 

To tMs proposal Burian replied with an- 
other, offering a much enlarged territory to 
the north of Trento, including most of the 
Italian-speaking Tirol, but declining the 
other Italian demands. The Italian Ambas- 
sador to Vienna reported that he thought 
Austria might possibly consent to some mod- 
ifications of the boundary between Priuli 
and the valley of the Isonzo and a recogni- 
tion of Italian sovereignty over Valona, but 
nothing more. 

On May 3 Sonino instructed the Italian 
Ambassador to denounce the treaty with 
Austria-Hungary, and on May 4 the Ambas- 
sador reported that he had obeyed orders, 
and with this last dispatch the *^Libro 
Verde" closes. 

The history of the negotiations has, how- 
ever, been carried a step further by the Im- 
perial German Chancellor, who in his speech 



Italy 



155 



to the Eeichstag on May 18 stated that Aus- 
tria-Hungary had offered certain conces- 
sions to Italy. He mentioned no dates, but 
it is clear that the offer was made after 
Italy had denounced her treaty with the 
Dual Monarchy. 

According to Dr. von Bethmann-Hollweg 
Austria-Hungary offered to cede to Italy 
Italian Tirol and the west bank of the 
Isonzo, including the city of Gradiska, to 
make of Trieste a free city of the empire 
with an Italian university and freedom from 
military service for its inhabitants, to yield 
all Austrian and Hungarian interests in Al- 
bania, and to recognize Italian interests in 
that country and Italian sovereignty over 
Valona. 

Germany promised to guarantee Austria- 
Hungary's good faith and loyalty in execut- 
ing the agreement. Subsequently the Aus- 



156 The Heel of War 

trian Ambassador in Rome stated that the 
offer was for cession of territory within 
thirty days after ratification. 

It is possible, and even probable, that if, 
before May 4, Austria-Hungary had agreed 
to immediate cession of territory war might 
have been averted, for it is doubtful if the 
Italian Government would or could have 
refused the Austrian offer, even though it 
did not meet all the requirements of the 
Italian demand. Austria's mistake was in 
not yielding soon enough. 

Knowing the Italian disposition to bar- 
gain, she did not realize that the Italian de- 
mand of April 8 was really an ultimatum. 
She assumed that it was a bluff, and that by 
prolonging negotiations she could make bet- 
ter terms. 

She utterly failed to understand that 
Italy's military preparations were now com- 



Italy 



157 



plete and that the Italian Government had 
nothing to gain by further delay. When 
Italy broke off relations with her she was 
honestly surprised, and then, when too late, 
yielded almost everything that Italy had de- 
sired. 

She did not, however, yield everything, 
refusing enough to justify Sonino, at least 
in his own eyes, in the course he proceeded 
to follow. Although Sonino had made a 
quasi arrangement with England, and as the 
newspapers expressed it, "the national hon- 
or was involved," even then war might have 
been averted had Austria been willing to 
yield unreservedly to the Italian demands. 

What Prince von Billow's feelings must 
have been can be easily imagined. He came 
within sight of complete success, only to see 
the plans which his patience and great abil- 
ity had been preparing through five months 



158 The Heel of War 

of heart-breaking negotiations come to noth- 
ing because of the obstinacy of those in con- 
trol of the Hapsburg Empire. 

The Italian Government press has ex- 
plained that the final Austrian offer made 
before relations were broken off could under 
no circumstances have been accepted. As 
Signor Giolitti has expressed it, '4'appetito 
cresce mangiando" — '^the appetite grows in 
eating." The appetite of the country had 
grown to such an extent that nothing short 
of immediate cession would satisfy it. 

It is insisted that a new promise to deliver 
at a future date would inevitably have re- 
sulted in a revolution in Italy, in which even 
the army might have taken part. Moreover, 
it is claimed that if the Central Empires 
had won they might have felt themselves 
strong enough to repudiate the bargain, 



Italy 



159 



while if they had lost they would not have 
been strong enough to carry it out. 

On the other hand, Austria's refusal up to 
May 4 to cede an inch of territory until after 
the war was supported by her press on the 
same ground of fear of revolution, and it 
was urged that war with the possibility of 
victory was preferable to the certainty of 
revolution with the probable fall of the 
dynasty. 

Some time before the deadlock became cer- 
tain, in fact when von Biilow was still very 
hopeful of bringing Austria and Italy to- 
gether, the Italian Government had begun 
to feel out the Allies, and finally, if the 
Italian press is to be believed, on April 25, 
at the same time that they were negotiating 
with the Central Empires, made a qualified 
agreement with Great Britain acting on be- 
half of herself, Russia, and Prance. 



160 The Heel of War 

WHle the terms of this agreement have 
not been officially published, it is generally 
understood that it provided that if before 
May 25 Italy should declare war against 
Austria she should be given a seaport in 
Somaliland, a slight rectification of the 
boundary between Tunisia and Tripoli, a 
free hand in Albania, the undisputed posses- 
sion of any Austro-Hungarian territory she 
might conquer and hold at the close of the 
war, and large enough loans to finance her 
operations. 

Soon after the treaty with Austria-Hun- 
gary was denounced the quasi treaty with 
Great Britain was made definite and Italy 
was bound, as far as the Ministry could bind 
her, to join the Allies against the Central 
Empires. 

While the agreement with the Allies was 
kept secret, it had hardly been made when 



Italy 



161 



it became perfectly evident that Italy in- 
tended to break with the Triple Alliance. 
The Government newspapers openly pro- 
claimed the necessity of war, laughed at the 
proposed Austrian concessions as being ut- 
terly inadequate and as having been offered 
too late, and insisted that the honor of the 
country required her to fight. 



CHAPTER yill 

GIOLITTI AND THB ITALIAN GOVERNMENT 

For fifteen years GioUtti lias dominated Italian politics. 
Government furious at Giolitti^s intervention, 
Resignations of ministry banded in. Example of 
mob psycbology. King attempted to form new gov" 
ernment. Continuation of Salandra ministry. War 
declared against Austria=Hungary. Italy doomed to 
disappointment no matter wbat the outcome may 
be. Conduct of Italian people worthy of highest 
praise, 

THE people had concluded that war 
was inevitable when one morning 
Signor Giolitti reached Eome. 
Giolitti is the most powerful individual, one 
of the most admired, most feared, and most 
hated in the kingdom. For fifteen years he 
has dominated Italian politics and abso- 
lutely controlled the Chamber of Deputies. 
His enemies charge him with questionable 
political practices, and with being a man 

162 



Giolitti 163 

who holds his power by machine methods. 

All this may be true, but if so, he has only 
followed the system of his predecessors, 
Crispi and Depretis. In the eyes of his op- 
ponents his greatest sin has been his suc- 
cess, for the little men who rail against him 
have all tried unsuccessfully to copy him. 
Whether one likes the man and approves 
of his methods or not, one must concede his 
patriotism and great force of character. 

The present Government was originally 
his creation, and San Giuliano was his old 
Foreign Minister. The advent of Sonino 
caused the Salandra Ministry to break with 
its creator, for there is no love lost between 
Sonino and Giolitti, and Sonino is the domi- 
nant force in the present Government. 

From the very beginning of the war Gio- 
litti has not hesitated to state his belief that 
Italy could obtain ^^parechi compensi" — 



164 The Heel of War 



6i 



some compensations" — from Austria with- 
out fighting, and lie has earnestly opposed 
Italy's entrance into the war except as a last 
resort. 

Immediately after his arrival in the capi- 
tal he made his position perfectly clear. He 
was of the opinion that the Austrian offer 
made after May 4 should be accepted as be- 
ing all that Italy could possibly expect, 
that war would delay Italian progress for 
fifty years, that even if she were able to 
conquer territory inhabited by Germans and 
Slavs and were to keep it, she would have 
on her hands ' ' a problem of inverse irredent- 
ism, worse even than has been the German 
problem of Alsace and Lorraine," and, most 
important of all, that to wage war against 
Germany and Austria-Hxmgary, for more 
than a quarter of a century her allies, would 
be on the part of Italy an act of shameless 



Giolitti 165 

national perfidy. He has been quoted as 
saying, *'If Italy goes to war, whatever the 
outcome, the results are bound to be most 
sad," (tristissimi). 

The Government was furious at Giolitti 's 
interference. They had bound themselves in 
their secret arrangement with Great Brit- 
ain, and saw their power to carry out their 
agreement slipping f ro^ them. They tried 
in vain to break Giolitti 's power. The serv- 
ices of d'Annunzio were secured, and the 
poet of decadence spoke early and late in 
favor of war. 

The Government press charged Giolitti 
with having sold himself to Germany for 
cash, and abused all who opposed the Gov- 
ernment program with a violence and a 
scurrility impossible in any other country. 
It was hinted that the national honor re- 
quired a declaration of war, and Government 



166 The Heel of War 

supporters went as far as they dared in sug- 
gesting the existence of an arrangement 
with England. 

But, despite all their efforts, Salandra and 
Sonino found that the Chamber had rallied 
to Giolitti and that the country was rapidly 
following the Chamber. Had Giolitti been 
given two days more there would have been 
no war, but the Government was desperate 
and played its last card. 

The resignations of the Ministry were 
handed to the King, and immediately inter- 
ventionist demonstrations began all over 
Italy. These demonstrations were so evi- 
dently artificial that it was obvious they 
were organized or at least encouraged by 
agents either in the employment of the Gov- 
ernment or its friends. 

Any one who saw the Italian general 
strike last year must have been greatly im- 



Giolitti 167 

pressed by the difference between it and the 
recent anti-peace outbursts. The crowds who 
created the disorders of last year were com- 
posed of grown men, who meant business 
and who were out for trouble. The crowds 
to whom d'Annunzio spoke and who paraded 
the streets shouting **a morte Giolitti, viva 
la guerra," were made up almost entirely 
of half -grown lads and schoolboys, hardly 
any of whom were of military age. 

The Government treated these very good- 
natured and orderly mobs with the greatest 
seriousness, and had in Rome at one time 
some twenty thousand men under arms, to 
control crowds which five hundred New 
York policemen could have handled easily. 
A few windows were broken, the signs of a 
few German shopkeepers were pulled down, 
and the Government newspapers announced 
that the revolution had come. 



168 The Heel of War 

Mob psychology is so curious that, while 

the crowds were in themselves harmless 
enough, their influence began to be felt 

everywhere. People who in the beginning 
had laughed at the whole matter, after two 
days of demonstrations reached the conclu- 
sion that revolution was really at hand, and 
many neutralisti honestly became convinced 
that the only alternative to revolution was 
war. 

The King, surrounded by troops, re- 
mained shut up in his villa outside the walls, 
all the shops were closed, and Italy stam- 
peded. 

Meanwhile the King had made two or 
three half-hearted and unsuccessful at- 
tempts to form a new Government. After 
the Cabinet crisis had lasted two days, dur- 
ing which the pro-war demonstrations grew 
constantly more noisy, Salandra was sent for 



Giolitti 169 

and informed that his resignation was de- 
clined. The announcement that the Salan- 
dra Ministry was to continue, with the con- 
sequent certainty of war, was received with 
apparently general enthusiasm, and that 
night all Rome demonstrated in favor of 
immediate hostilities. 

On May 20 Parliament met and adjourned 
after having virtually Suspended the Consti- 
tution by giving the Cabinet dictatorial pow- 
ers to declare war and govern the country 
during its continuance. On May 23 Italy 
declared war against Austria-Hungary, and 
the next day von Biilow left Eome. 

Ten days before war was declared a ma- 
jority of the people were undoubtedly for 
peace, but changes in public opinion come in 
Italy with such extraordinary suddenness 
that what would be impossible elsewhere is 
quite possible there. 



170 The Heel of War 

So it may be that for the moment at least 
the Italian people are sincerely in favor of 
war. Of course, although a noisy minority 
often can succeed in forcing an unwilling 
majority to do its bidding, for various rea- 
sons during the last weeks of peace many 
Italians were converted from a neutralist to 
an interventionist attitude. 

A great number of these converts support 
the war as the only refuge from revolution, 
others believe that the only half acknowledg- 
ed agreement with Great Britain so compro- 
mised the national honor as to make war in- 
evitable, while with many their hatred of 
Giolitti has blinded them to the merits or 
wisdom of the course the Government has 
adopted. 

These latter frankly say that they prefer 
war with all its risks to a peace preserved by 
the Deputy from Dronero, with the cer- 



Giolitti 171 

tainty of its resulting in his return to power. 
Besides there are those who honestly believe 
that Austria's offer of compensation was 
insufficient, and nurse the delusion that the 
Allies, if victorious, will permit them not 
only to make of the Adriatic an Italian lake, 
but also to share in the Turkish spoils in 
Europe and Asia. 

Of course, Signor Salandra, or rather 
Barone Sonino, could not be expected at the 
last moment to do other than follow the 
course he had marked out from the begin- 
ning. With Salandra at the head of affairs, 
German military success was the only ar- 
gument that could have preserved Italian 
neutrality, and a succession of important 
German victories would doubtless have al- 
tered the situation. 

Last autumn the Italian Government evi- 
dently believed that the Central Empires 



172 The Heel of War 

would win, and, as San Giuliano said, '^did 
not consider the time opportune for a discus- 
sion of the question of compensation." As 
the chances of great German success grew 
less and as it became constantly more evi- 
dent that the war might end in a draw or 
in a German defeat, Barone Sonino felt that 
the time had become most opportune for 
such a discussion. 

The Goyernment obviously decided that 
the future belonged to the Allies, and for 
the sake of Italian interests aligned them- 
selves with the side they believed would win. 
There has been absolutely no pretense of 
sentiment in the matter. Sonino is prob- 
ably prejudiced in favor of England, but 
excepting him very few prominent Italians 
have any particular liking for their new 
friends. 

Had the Government not carried on ne- 



Giolitti 173 

gotiations with both sides at once, with the 
Central Empires and the Allies at the same 
time, it would have been free to accept Aus- 
tria's final offer. Without striking a blow 
Italy could have realized almost all her na- 
tional ambitions, and at the same time would 
have kept faith with her allies. As it is, 
she has broken with h^r old associates and 
begun a war the end of which no man can 
see, but that cannot possibly give her more 
than she could have gained without fighting. 
No matter who may win, Italy can never 
realize her great expectations. If the Cen- 
tral Empires should triumph, she will be ex- 
tremely fortunate if she is permitted to re- 
main intact, while if the Allies should win, 
no matter how great the victory may be, she 
is doomed to disappointment, for it is past 
belief that Great Britain and France will 



174 The Heel of War 

permit her to dismember Austria and make 
of the Adriatic an Italian lake. 

Had she entered the war from altruistic 
motives the risk she is taking would have 
been perfectly justified, as it would be had 
she been attacked. But she has forced war 
on Germany and Austria-Hungary solely 
for the purpose of furthering her national 
interests by acquiring Austrian territory. 

The nine months which preceded Italy's 
declaration of war were, it is true, a period 
of sordid bargaining and intrigue on the 
part of the politicians who control the Grov- 
ernment. But it was a period lightened and 
relieved by the conduct of the Italian peo- 
ple. 

Their patience through it all, their calm- 
ness and cheerfulness have been extraordi- 
nary. Times have been cmielly hard in Italy, 
and the poverty and real suffering have 



Giolitti 175 

been greater than at any time in the history 
of the new kingdom. 

For nine months they lived literally from 
day to day, never knowing what the next 
day might bring forth. Their Government 
at no time took them into its confidence, and 
they really knew less of what was going on 
than did any intelligent outsider. Until the 
demonstrations in May were organized or 
accelerated there was never a hint of weari- 
ness or impatience, for all classes bore the 
hardships and sacrifices of the winter with 
exemplary good-will and fortitude. 

Now that the time of waiting is over and 
the day of action has arrived, they have ap- 
parently all agreed to forget past differences 
and to look only forward. Most of them did 
not want war, but all — those who wanted 
war and those who did not, those who 
thought war inevitable and those who be- 



176 The Heel of War 

lieved that a wiser leadership might have 
avoided it — are imited in their belief that, 
right or wrong, La Patria must be sup- 
ported. 

At first most of the people took the war in 
the same happy spirit in which they take a 
holiday. They were so convinced of the in- 
vincibility of La Patria that they believed 
her entrance on the side of the Allies would 
result in the defeat of the Central Empires 
in a few weeks, and besides they had no con- 
ception of the horrors of war, of its cost in 
men and misery, and anything was better 
than the dreadful uncertainty of not know- 
ing when it would begin. Very soon the 
spirit of the people changed, so that the gen- 
eral mobilization saw the regiments march- 
ing to the front, not singing or cheering, but 
in silence, leaving behind their mothers and 
their wives and their sweethearts. 



Giolitti 177 

If since the great European war began 
there has been but little to admire in the 
conduct of the politicians in control of the 
Italian Government, the conduct of the Ital- 
ian people has been worthy of all praise. If 
the war which Italy has undertaken results 
in her everlasting credit and glory, no 
thanks will be due to those who might hon- 
orably have avoided -it but nevertheless 
brought it about, but the honor will belong to 
the nation itseK, because of the self-sacri- 
fice, the endurance, and the patriotism of the 
people. 



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